Rest in Peace Dieuseul ‘Tiger’ Berto, age 60
John Hosegood: “The guy, he’s bigger than life. You just didn’t … it’s hard, it’s hard to imagine somebody like that losing to anything.”
Dieseul ‘Tiger’ Berto, father of world champion boxer Andre Berto, has passed away at the age of 60, after battling an illness
Berto, a pioneer of the MMA scene in Florida, ran Tiger’s World gym in Winter Haven gym, where he trained top fighters, and as well helped regular people lose weight.
He was really upbeat and positive, and right before I left the gravity of the situation sunk in,” said MMA fighter John Hosegood to Stepanie Claytor for Bay News 9. “He knew he didn’t have that much time left.”
Berto trained Hosegood in the early 1990s.
Nobody even knew what it was,” recalled Hosegood. “But he had been fighting around the world at that point in Japan and Brazil back when the sport was in its infancy, and he brought that to Florida and started training a handful of those guys. We would do conditioning for an hour to an hour-and-a-half before we even started training how to fight, because he said you didn’t have to be the best fighter — you just had to be in the best shape.”
The guy, he’s bigger than life. You just didn’t … it’s hard, it’s hard to imagine somebody like that losing to anything.”