Emanuel “Vaquero” Navarrete is preparing for the most important battle of his career.
The WBO/IBF super featherweight king will face WBC champion O’Shaquie Foster in a unification showdown on Saturday, Oct. 24, at Frost Bank Center in San Antonio.
In the 10-round featherweight co-feature, unbeaten Albert “Chop Chop” Gonzalez steps up against Fort Worth native and former two-time world title challenger Edward Vazquez.
Additionally, super lightweight contender Frank Martin will face Morocco’s Tarik Zaina in a 10-rounder, while unbeaten Steven Navarro meets Emanuel Moreno in a 10-round bantamweight scrap.
Navarrete-Foster, Gonzalez-Vazquez, Martin-Zaina and Navarro-Moreno will be streamed LIVE on DAZN beginning at 8 p.m. ET/5 p.m. PT.
Before the main broadcast, additional undercard action will stream live on DAZN, Top Rank and DAZN’s YouTube channels, and the Top Rank Classics FAST channel on Roku, Tubi, Pluto and Vizio.
Promoted by Top Rank, tickets are available via Ticketmaster.com.
Navarrete (40-2-1, 33 KOs), a three-division world champion, has won titles at super bantamweight, featherweight and super featherweight. After an unsuccessful May 2024 lightweight title bid against Denys Berinchyk, he returned to 130, where he stopped Oscar Valdez in their December 2024 rematch before facing Charly Suarez the following May. In February, he delivered a career-best performance, stopping hard-punching IBF champion Eduardo Nuñez in the 11th round. Foster (25-3, 12 KOs) has hit top form, defeating Stephen Fulton last December before defending his title against Raymond Ford in May.
Following a recent training session in San Juan Zitlaltepec, this is what Navarrete said:
On his daily training routine…
“I start with cardio in the morning. Then, at one, we box for about two or three hours. And at night, around seven or eight, we go back to the gym. That’s when I work with my strength and conditioning coach. We’ve been adding some things that I wasn’t doing before. I feel a little stronger, more solid. It’s a little more difficult because there’s more wear and tear and less time to rest, but I feel stronger and more solid. We do this six days a week, and on Sunday we try to rest completely. We’ve been in camp for almost two months.”
On how training camp is progressing…
“I feel good and strong. I think our training camp is right where it needs to be at this point ahead of the fight. We’re going to make the most of the time we have left, and I’m confident we’ll arrive in excellent condition on fight night.”
On Foster and his approach to the fight…
“He is a great champion. He looks very good, very solid, very confident, and I think that will help us put on an excellent fight. Knowing how Foster boxes and what I can offer inside the ring, I think we’re going to try to pressure him and look to land to the body so that he starts slowing down and we can catch him more cleanly and more often in the later rounds.”
On what gives him confidence against Foster…
“We all know that fighting against Foster is very difficult. He likes to move around a lot, but that’s something we can work on. I’m confident that he hasn’t faced a fighter like me, and I think that can help me. Either way, the foundation of all of this is the work, the preparation and how much we’re demanding of ourselves in this camp.”
On what the unification means for Mexican boxing…
“I think this fight is going to mean a lot for Mexican boxing. That it’s a unification for three titles speaks for itself. I think this fight is going to be very important in the history of Mexican boxing, and I think a win would be something tremendous for Mexico.”
