Chantelle Cameron Says Katie Taylor Loss Made Her 'Dangerous' vs Mayer

Chantelle Cameron walks into Birmingham this Saturday chasing Mikaela Mayer's unified super-welterweight titles — the WBC, WBO and WBA 154lb straps — and she's doing it with the only loss of her career still sitting on her record. That defeat came in 2023, the rematch against Katie Taylor, after Cameron had shocked the Irishwoman in their first meeting the same year to hand Taylor her own maiden pro loss.

The 35-year-old from Northampton says the sting of that night has actually loosened her up. She told Boxing News that losing isn't the be-all and end-all she once feared, and that with her ambitions already ticked off, everything from here is a bonus. Her words: she's got nothing to lose now, and that makes her more dangerous.

Coming Home to the Right Corner

After the Taylor rematch, Cameron went looking. She worked with Grant Smith and Stephen 'Swifty' Smith, but the itch never went away. She reunited with Jamie Moore and Nigel Travis for her last outing — a unanimous decision over Michaela Kotaskova in April — and has since planted roots in Manchester, house and all.

She frames the reunion in blunt terms: boxing's a brutal sport, and you want to grind through it beside people you actually love. Moore and Travis, she says, are family. It's the kind of settled-camp narrative that tends to matter more in these fights than the pundits admit.

The Rounds Fight She Lost

There's a wrinkle to Saturday. That Kotaskova win was Cameron's first bout over 10 three-minute rounds, and she liked what she learned — how to pace herself, how not to burn out on adrenaline. She wanted the same format against Mayer, convinced she can now push a higher tempo across the longer stanzas.

WBC president Mauricio Sulaiman won't sanction three-minute rounds in women's boxing, so it's back to 10 twos. Cameron conceded that at the table but won a concession of her own: a 148lb catchweight. She says the three-minute experiment is one she'll return to after this fight, and she's frustrated she can't test her new gear against Mayer.

So the maths for Saturday is simple enough. Cameron, one loss on her ledger and a chip removed from her shoulder, versus a unified champion's three belts. If her theory holds — that a fighter with nothing to prove is the hardest kind to beat — Mayer's about to find out first-hand.