Verhoeven once sparred with former Ring and WBC heavyweight champion Tyson Fury.

While Fury got the better of Verhoeven, he loved the experience of sharing the ring with the 6-foot-9 Englishman and saw the benefits for his kickboxing career.

“It was back in the day, and he was here in the Netherlands, training with his uncle, and still, my trainer, Peter Fury, and they were looking for sparring,” Verhoeven said on Inside The Ring on Monday.

“So my trainer Dennis [Krauweel], he said, ‘Hey, we got this big boxer. He's looking for sparring and I think it's good for you.’ [I said,] ‘Yeah, let's do it.’

“That was one hell of a sparring. He closed both my eyes, and I was like, ‘Wow, this was crazy. I love it. I can learn so much from this guy.”

Peter Fury will be Verhoeven’s trainer when he faces Usyk.

Usyk and Verhoeven will meet in a 12-round heavyweight bout on May 23 at Pyramids of Giza in Egypt, on DAZN. Usyk (24-0, 15 KOs), who is The Ring’s No. 1-ranked fighter pound-for-pound, holds the Ring, IBF, WBA and WBC heavyweight titles. The WBC is sanctioning the bout as a voluntary title defense for the three-time and two-division undisputed champion.

Verhoeven is 66-10 with 21 KOs as a kickboxer and reigned as the heavyweight champion in Glory, the top kickboxing organization in the world, from 2013 to 2025 before vacating the title last November. He only lost once in that span, suffering a unanimous decision defeat to Andrey Gerasimchuk at Kunlun Fight 15 in 2015.

The 36-year-old Dutch kickboxer last fought on June 14, defeating former Glory light heavyweight champion Artem Vakhitov by unanimous decision. Verhoeven has one professional boxing match under his belt, which he won by second-round knockout against a winless Janos Finfera in 2014.

Usyk, 39, became the undisputed heavyweight champion for the second time in his last fight, a fifth-round knockout of Daniel Dubois on July 19 at Wembley Stadium. Usyk, who was also the undisputed champion at cruiserweight, has two wins apiece over Fury, Dubois and Anthony Joshua.