Category Archives: Uncategorized

Great night of boxing

Leave a reply

Great night of boxing

Amir Khan v Marcos Maidan. Photograph: Ethan Miller/Getty Images

Last night was a tremendous night of boxing on HBO and Showtime.

Joseph Agbeko-Yonnhy Perez. Photo Credit: ESPN

Showtime’s line-up included the first two fights in their bantamweight tournament. Beginning with the Abner Mares late round victory over Vic Darchinyan and Joseph Abeko’s stunning victory over Yonnhy Perez in a bout that everyone assumed would lead to a repeat of Perez’s victory last year.

Over on HBO, the undercard fight between Victor Ortiz and Lamont Peterson was scored a draw.

The fight of the night, however, belonged to Amir Khan and Marcos Maidana.

For those who didn’t see the Khan-Maidana fight, it fight is worth caching when HBO replays it or when they offer it “on demand.”  To my mind, Khan looked great through the first 9 rounds. What he’s got to work on though, is how to handle getting backed up into the ropes. He took a lot of punishment from Maidana from stiff upper cuts that really hurt him in the 10th, 11th and 12th.  Still and all, Khan proved himself to be a warrior and pulled out a tremendous victory to retain his WBA light-welterweight title.

For a great piece on the Khan-Maidana fight check out the article in the UK Guardian. The link to the article is here.

 

One other fight last night was Girlboxing’s friend Jill Morley’s victory in the Costa Mesa Master’s Tournament.  Jill is finishing up her film “Girl in the Ring” (previously known as “Fighting It”) and true to her subject is “fighting it” in the ring!

Get your tickets!

Leave a reply

Get your tickets!

New York’s own Million Dollar Baby, Maureen Shea has moved on to the promoting side of the business as president of Pandora Promotions.   Her first big venture in association with Global Boxing will be a fabulous night of boxing at Brooklyn’s Masonic Temple featuring WBC Super Bantamweight, Alicia “Slick” Ashley in the main event.  The fight will take place on Thursday, January 13th, 2011.  Tickets are available from Gleason’s Gym and Global Boxing Gym.  Seems like a great addition to your Santa list!

If you’ve never watched Alicia fight, it’s a treat.

Women who box

Leave a reply

Women who box

Nechama Brodie ready for a 'white collar' bout at the Armoury Boxing Club in Cape Town taking it like a woman on Fight Night. (David Harrison, M&G)

Women’s boxing has taken on a global character.  What’s interesting is many of the drivers for women’s participation in the sport seem universal:  empowerment, fitness and a way to get themselves where they want to go.

An article in a South African paper caught my eye this morning.  The article is written by Nechama Brodie.  She has entered the ring as a “white collar” boxer in two fights out of Johannesburg and Cape Town, South Africa.

As she writes, even sparring is not for the faint of heart. “‘Get used to it. It’s a man’s sport,’  [trainer] Shayvonne Pattison said to me, when I asked her to stop hitting me quite so hard in the head.”

The allusion to it’s being a “man’s sport,” however, has more to do with the seriousness of the intent during training, something many women who train will attest — so much so, that in my opinion boxing is certainly a “woman’s sport” with all the heart and fortitude that it implies.  As well, with the run-up to the 2012 Olympics, women’s boxing is beginning to engender the respect it’s deserved all along.

Her article is a well-written piece published in this South Africa’s Mail & Guardian Online edition and can be found here.

Getting them to the gym early

Leave a reply

Getting them to the gym early

I live in a two-boxer family and if I count the young-one, we’re coming on three boxers.  As the trainers down at Gleason’s are happy to remind us, my daughter was practically born in the gym.  There are many stories told of how she was passed from one lap to another while my husband or I trained.  Her comfort today is telling every time she walks into the gym.  She’s got folks to say hello to,  her trainer, John “Superman” Douglas to fist-bump, and a general feeling of ease as she watches us workout or works out herself.

When it comes to kids in the gym, I always advise parents that there is no place finer to introduce a child not only to the intricacies of the sweet science, but to the rarified world of camaraderie, focus and importantly, people’s dreams.  A boxing gym provides children with a place where they can experience people working very, very hard to achieve complex goals that range from personal fitness to readying for professional bouts.

The boxing gym is also a place where children can learn great physical skills, confidence and a work ethic that will carry them across a lifetime — and this without ever really needing to fight in a bout.  The boxing work out alone with a skilled trainer or in a group class will provide kids with the chance to develop prowess in the boxing repertoire and for those parents who might object to their kids sparring, pad work and shadow boxing can simulate some of the movements of the ring.  Girls especially get a lot out of boxing training — not the least of which is learning how to physically defend themselves.

There’s also something else that happens in a boxing gym: a chance for people from all walks of life to interact and communicate.  In the over-scheduled world of contemporary child rearing, that sort of experience is invaluable as is the “drift” time that happens as you wait your turn.

For more information on children’s boxing programs, parents can contact their local PAL organizations. Many boxing gyms also provide opportunities for training children individually or in groups.  You can also contact Girlboxing and we’ll be happy to pass on what information we have.

Housebound

Leave a reply

Housebound

My daughter has been sick off-and-on with a low-grade fever and headaches over the past few days. This has meant that my husband has been at home taking care of her — and has himself caught whatever bug she’s had.

On those sorts of days when bed, TV and iPad games are your best friends it’s hard to get motivated enough to reset your bed covers, never mind do anything remotely physical. As the fog of misery begins to roll back, however, one sure way of pushing through the rest of the way is to sweat it out with some robust exercise finished by a nice steam.

By robust, of course, I don’t necessarily mean running a marathon, but first off, dragging your bones out of bed and into a hot shower to help you reset yourself.  And sure, if you feel as if you’re about to faint at that point, bed is surely your only option, but if you get out of the shower feeling refreshed and human again, the next step is to get your body moving.  Think Army calisthenics and get into yours sweats and start either with a quick stretch followed by run around the block — or a brisk walk to your gym to make war on the machines or a heaving bag.  What you want is a nice healthy sweat to get all of those toxins out — and as for the steam, if you don’t have access to one, get back in the shower with the water on hot and feel that junk rolling off you and down the drain.

Of course if you can’t run out the door, there’s nothing like shadow boxing to “I Will Survive”!

PS – As this is UMG, it may bounce you back to You Tube.

Getting started

2 Replies

Getting started

If you’ve never boxed before, one of the hardest things to overcome is understanding that it’s okay if you don’t know how to box!  Let’s face it, that’s why you are walking into the ring in the first place.

The great mystery for me when I got started was how my body could stay centered, balanced and move as a coordinated unit while attempting to throw a jab.  I must have thrown thousands before I figured out that “less is more,” and even then it was sort of an accidental discovery.  The main point is, do not despair, you will get it!

There are many patient, talented trainers who will be more than willing to share their knowledge of the sweet science with you as long as you come to it with an open mind and the commitment to work hard as you learn the basics.  Where you go doesn’t matter so much as finding a trainer you feel comfortable with.

Don’t worry about gear either, the gym usually supplies the basics as will your trainer — whether your taking a class or working one-on-one with someone.  The main thing is to relax and have fun — and remember that it really is good to hit things!

You might also like:

It’s good to hit things

Learning to box

No pitty-pat

Boxing gifts

Leave a reply

Boxing gifts

At this time of year, when I’m asked “what do you want for Christmas?”  I pretty much “cut to the chase” and hand over my list of items large and small.  Specific to boxing, Christmas (and Hanukkah for that matter) is a great time to give and receive fabulous boxing inspired goodies.

As you build your list, you might want to take an inventory of the things you do have so that you can sort out what items to add.  A biggie is checking out the state of your handwraps.  Boxers are usually very persnickety about which handwraps to use — to include color in some cases.  They’re also a pain to buy because they are not available at every gym and require a special trip to places like the Sports Authority — and even then they may not have what you want.  The alternative is ordering from one of the major boxing catalogs.  If you’re anything like me you hold off because the order is too small and there you are, two or three years later with the rattiest looking wraps you’ve ever seen.

From there it’s time to peruse the online catalogs and dream.  

Do you figure it’s time to start using your own speed bag or double-ended bag and not your trainer’s?  Do you need a better quality jump rope?  Are your boxing T’s too funky for school?  Want to start using your own water bottle with a spout rather than spending a small fortune on bottled water?  How about other little stocking stuffers — new mouth guards, adhesive tape, boxing books or the “speed bible” DVD?

Then there’s the matter of getting yourself a pair of real honest-to-goodness boxing shorts — yep, with your name on them, or a boxing robe, or some other tangible symbol of all of your effort this past year.

It’s also a great time to trade up on your boxing gloves, or to get a pair of specialized gloves for hitting the bag.  You might also think its time to invest in your own headgear or other boxing protective gear — or a really nice new boxing bag to haul your stuff around in.

When it comes to gloves, however, you might want to consider having a pair made just for you!  This can come into the category of something you splurge on for yourself, have someone buy for you — or something you might purchase for someone else.  There are two specialty places that I know of (see list below) or the folks in your gym may have some tips for you.

Purchasing boxing T’s say from Gleason’s or some other boxing gym are also fun gifts to give.  I cherish the “Lonsdale” T-shirt my husband got me, sort of what Everlast is to the US, the Lonsdale brand is to the UK.

The main thing is — don’t be afraid to ask for what you really want along with the website URL, size, color and brand name of the item.

Who knows, you just might get it!

 

Online Boxing Websites include the following:

For customized boxing gear:

Sites we like about women’s boxing

9 Replies

Blogs we like about women’s boxing

If you are looking for blogs by women who talk about the sweet science from the perspective of hauling themselves to the gym, here are a few Girlboxing has found around the web you might enjoy.

Girl.Boxer.Southpaw:  Girlboxing enjoys reading this blog.  It offers insightful and inspiring pieces on what it means to get up and train.  The link is here.

The glowing edge:  Terrific blog that mixes boxing news, personal boxing stories and the daily stuff about life.   The link is here.

The Sweetest thing:  A view of women’s boxing from Australia with a lot of salient points on the difficulties women face in the ring.  The link is here.

Binnie Klein:  Binnie Klein is a women after Girlboxing’s heart who wrote “Blows to the Head: How Boxing Changed my Mind.”    The link is here.

As for straight-up news about women in boxing WBAN – Woman’s Boxing Network is worth checking out.  Do they report on all the regional fights or have all  the latest news all the time – not necessarily, but given their focus WBAN does a good job of keeping women’s professional boxing in focus.  The link is here.

 

PS – Please pass along any blogs you like about women’s boxing in the comments field!

 

I want to live

2 Replies

I want to live

A dear young friend of Girlboxing has been diagnosed with an aggressive breast cancer.  Barely 30 she is facing the kinds of challenges and life or death decisions that no one should ever have to face, never mind a person as vital and full of life as she.

It reminds me that all of us face deeply troubling and difficult problems that can be as debilitating emotionally as they are physically or quite frankly, the other way around, wherein feeling crippled by loss or depression can lead to a physical manifestation of suffering.

Cure alls for these sorts of troubles are near-on impossible, but there are ways of coping that can help find a place for laughter and smiles along side the hugely daunting task of getting through a difficult time.

So of course you know where I’m going with this in the sense of “working it out on the bag,” but more so, finding the “daily something,” the space that’s yours and yours alone can be a source of inspiration and hope to keep you going.

My Aunt was just such a person.  She had every serious and debilitating disease one can have including four different cancers (one breast each and two lung cancers), two heart attacks, three strokes and kidneys that managed to function despite no registry on her blood tests, oh and the diabetes she managed to “cure” through changes to her diet.

Her philosophy for coping was simple.  She’d wake up everyday and tell herself “I want to live.”   This became her mantra:  “I want to live.”  She said this often and always, and most particularly to her doctors who got to thinking that she must have inherited the spirit of several cat colonies because she kept using up lives and coming back.

With each new diagnosis, she’d yell it louder:  “I want to live.”   And the same with each day after radiation treatments, chemo treatments, blood transfusions, midnight schleps to the hospital, or day-long waits in the ER.  “I want to live,” she’d call me and say as we worked through the choices she had to face – all the while never missing a hair appointment or her weekly manicure.  And taking care of those details, walking into her doctor’s as decked out as she could muster gave her something to twinkle about – and that made it infectious.  Her doctors took on her mantra saying, “She wants to live,” thus rallying around her and giving it their best to ensure that she’d have that chance.

When she did finally pass I felt a deep and abiding sadness, but knowing that she had pushed herself to the limit of what her body could take and then some gave me a peaceful sense that she was ready to be where she needed to be.  I also understood that her “daily something” was her effort to stay alive; to give herself the energy and pluck to fight each and every round to its fullest.

As well, I know that we all have that in us.  It’s just a matter of finding that one space that helps us work things through no matter if it’s a potter’s wheel a double-ended bag or a simple one line statement.  So whatever it is: writing a journal entry, walking a mile, learning something new or throwing nothing but lefts at a punching bag getting ready for the Golden Gloves; while your daily something won’t cure you, it sure will help to see you through.

 

Working it out on the bag

2 Replies

Working it out on the bag


What with Thanksgiving last week, Hanukkah celebrations this week and Christmas looming it’s the time of year when many of us can get hugely over-anxious and stressed out!  Sure some of us manage to get through it all with great joy in our hearts and nary a hurt feeling to consider, but many of us experience other emotions and have moments when we’d like nothing better than to chuck it all for a week in some other part of the world, preferably one without phones or email!

I’ve found that making the commitment to work out is a particularly helpful way to cope.  Whether it’s boxing, dancing, aikido, kickboxing, swimming, running or spinning for that matter — pursuing an active, physically engaging activity can provide a terrific way of getting rid of all the toxins that inevitably build during the countdown to the “holidays” and not just from all that overeating.

I like to think of it as working it out on the bag.  I take the plethora of “stuff” that inevitably gets kicked-up and give it a place to go.

Working it out on the bag means that you have a chance to chuck those things out of your body as a means of ridding yourself of the emotions that may otherwise be difficult to cope with.   And while I’ve found that the physical sensation of extending my body and hitting things gives me the chance to release a lot of “stuff,” any active physical experience of pounding something gives the sensation of pushing your body to its limit, such as the feel of the pavement when you’re running or a gym floor when you’re jumping rope.

The point is, these next few weeks are fraught with the pitfalls of a lot of heightened expectations including your own.  Perhaps the best present you can give yourself is the chance to work it all out on the bag long before you get to the point where you want to scream, cancel Christmas or take to your bed for days and days in the hopes that it’ll all end soon.

You might also like: it’s good to hit things

 

Boxing women

2 Replies

Boxing Women

I get annoyed at the notion that women’s boxing is some sort of  “novelty.”  Boxing is tough both mentally and physically and anyone with the temerity to get in the ring deserves our support.  My “beef” is in trying to find boxing results for women’s bouts the morning after! They are hard to find, WFAN excepted, though they may not have them on an “up-to-the-minute” basis.  What really steams me is when the results from the card are posted “absent” the women’s bouts.

Okay, I’ll get off the soapbox and show you a short from one of the thousands shot by the Thomas Edison Company in the late 1890’s and early 1900’s).  This “novelty” film of the boxing Gordon Sisters was shot on May 6, 1901.  The women were advertised as “Champion Lady Boxer’s” and had a boxing vaudeville act for several years.  If you are interested in more information you can find it here.

PS.  Girlboxing offers a shout out to heavyweight pro Sonya “The Scholar” Lamonakis for her win last night as part of Broadway Boxing’s fight night card at B. B. King’s.   With this win Sonya improves her record to 3-0.

Update:  Nice piece about Sonya from Boxing 24 News.com here.

Champions

Leave a reply

Champions

“You know what a champion is? A champion is someone who’s ready when the gong rings – not just before, not just after – but when it rings.”  – Jack Dempsey

The Times of India is covering a story on the 11th Women’s Boxing Championship that will be held in Thrissur, India.  Participants have started at their training camp in preparation for the first round of bouts on December 4th.  This championship shall set the stage for selecting the Indian national team that will go on to fight in the 2012 Olympics.

Many young Indian women are finding their way into boxing as a means of elevating their status — and getting themselves and their families out of poverty.  This is not so different from the reasons many young men and women have found their way into sport in the United States.  And let’s face it, while we think of it as a sport, in my opinion boxing is much more than that.  It is about heart and facing the kind of fear that can otherwise cripple a person.

A champion in the ring is a person who understands that and overcomes it.  Win or lose the mere fact of getting in the ring counts for something.  So, if you are fighting today, think about what Jack Dempsey said and be ready when the bell rings.

The New York Times wrote about the phenomenon of women’s boxing in India here.  It is worth the read.

Recent press about women’s boxing

Leave a reply

Recent press about women’s boxing

Here’s five recent press pieces related to women’s boxing that might be worth taking a look:

1.  Winning Starts Before the Fight:

Seattle based 2012 Olympic hopeful Queen Underwood who recently won two title fights at the first Women’s International Dual Series held in Oxnard, California is profiled in this piece.  The article was written by Alan Abrahamson and is published on Team USA’s boxing site here.

2. At 63, It’s Time for a Career Move:

A terrific article about personal trainer Lada St. Edmund, who started boxing in her 50’s and is now getting ready to take her exams to become a boxing referee. The piece was written by Brian Heyman for the New York Times and can be viewed here.

3.  My life in Sport: Daniella Smith:

The New Zealand Herald has an article by Dana Johannsen about New Zealand’s boxing champion Daniella Smith who recently won a ten-round fight in Berlin, Germany over Jennifer Retzke to gain the vacant IBF women’s welterweight title.  The mother of two began boxing 12 years ago and turned pro in 2005.  The article can be found here.

4.  Charity uses boxing to help girls build self confidence:

This piece in the LA Times written by Nate Jackson is about the organization KnockOuts for Girls (KO4G), a not for profit “boxing charity that specializes in training, fundraising and providing scholarships for underprivileged girls.”   The group recruits amateur and professional boxers as well as active models with an interest in the sweet science to help support the organization’s many programs.  The group’s website is here. The article can be found here.

5.  Big Cards Missing a Women’s Touch:

Over at Maxboxing.com, Ryan Maquinana has a written an article on the dearth of women fighters on big-name fight cards.  Referring to WBO super bantamweight champion, Ana Julatan, Maquinana makes note of the fact that her half-time visit on the court of a recent Golden State Warriors-New York Knicks game caused pandemonium in the stands.  His point is if she is such a crowd pleaser, how come Julatan and other terrific women fighters are nowhere to be found?  This piece is well worth reading and talking about. The link to the article is here.

Unfolding the bones

2 Replies

Unfolding the bones

I’m at the age where missing a day at the gym, never mind a week or two really hurts.  This weekend was a case in point.  I had a paper due (today) and aside from a couple of walks in the cold and some crunches, I was pretty much attached to my laptop.  And yeah, it feels good to have completed the work, by my body is an aching, creaky mess from spending hours at a time curled up on the couch with bad posture.  For breaks, I cooked meals, helped by daughter with homework and talked over the points of my paper with my husband, but I was pretty much engaged with writing for two days.

And the reckoning?  Aside from an extra pound on the scale, I’m faced with that “starting-over” feeling!

Solution?  Sun salutations, lots of stretching, really gentle shadow boxing and a brisk walk!  Abs can come later.  This sort of unfold-the-bones workout can be really helpful whenever you’ve been through a period of shall we say intense cerebral activity, aka, lying in bed watching TV, after a brief illness, or as in my case, when you’ve been on a deadline in a work or other context and have needed to type on a computer for long periods of time.

The point is not to despair — but to work it out.  I always find that a couple of days of modest meals also helps.  Not to the point of hunger, but just enough to feel as if I’ve given my body a real shot at dropping that extra pound before it gets to happy hanging around with all those other extra pounds.

Feeling the cold

Leave a reply
Feeling the cold
Maybe it’s the sudden onset of cold temperatures in Brooklyn (albeit still above freezing), but I don’t feel like going anywhere or doing anything, even though I’ve got a huge list of chores to take care of.  On those sorts of days, the only thing to do is to give myself permission to spend some extra minutes under the covers before putting the steel rod in my spine and lots of layers on my body as I head outside for a brisk walk.

I have to admit those first chilly intakes of breath make me want to run back inside, but after the first few minutes, I really do feel a whole lot better.

There’s a great new park only the Brooklyn waterfront just south of the Brooklyn Bridge.  The wind can be a bit bone-chilling, but there is nothing prettier especially as the city begins to wake-up on a Sunday morning.
By the time I get home from these sorts of brief walks, I’m ready to face the day, knowing that whatever else happens, I’ve already accomplished at least one thing, and believe me, that can really help oneself get through the rest of the day.