Board pops question to pill boxers

Boxing

Frank Bruno and Nigel Benn are to be questioned by the British Board of Control over a report that the two World Council champions are consuming 150 vitamin pills a day at their Tenerife training headquarters.

The Board's medical panel - concerned that such a prodigious intake of vitamin pills may be detrimental to the boxers' health - wants to discover the extent of their extra dietary intake. Professor Tom Sanders, head of nutrition and diet at King's College, London, has been quoted as saying that such a quantity "can cause problems".

Bruno and Benn are preparing together in the sunshine of the Canary Islands in readiness for their title defences against Mike Tyson and Sugar Boy Malinga respectively. The Board secretary, John Morris, said: "If you read a story that says Britain's top boxers could be putting themselves at risk, we want to know how and why."

The Board's chief medical officer, Adrian Whiteson, added: "I don't believe any vitamins they take would have any benefit to them whatsoever, other than a psychological one."