Club continues to honor boxing spirit

By Tasia Endo

Surveying the season ahead, Santa Clara boxing club president sophomore Alvarez Ramirez feels confident about a team that has come to resemble a family.

Close-knit camaraderie is just one of the factors motivating and inspiring the boxers for competitions like that of the Santa Clara community at the Dodge Ackerman Memorial.

On Feb. 25, the boxing team will host a seven-hour boxing event at the Pat Malley Fitness Center.

The Dodge Ackerman Memorial commemorates the loss of the Santa Clara boxing alumnus, a national collegiate champion who died of cancer on June 21, 2002.

Contributions from the Ackerman family and other alumni has enabled the boxing team to carry on his fighting spirit.

Though members compete individually, boxing is a team sport.

"Your fighting reflects your coaching and your teammates, because if I'm practicing with someone that is slacking, I'm just going to expect every other fighter to be a slacker and I'm not going to take care of myself, (be) lazy, and not go all out," Ramirez said.

"So if you train hard with your teammates, you're just making them that much better."

Sophomore Philip Herrera also recognizes the club's cohesiveness.

"On the outside it looks like we're just beating each other senseless, but there's a real sense of team. You're all training together and you're all learning together," Herrera said.

This season should prove to be quite a learning experience, indeed, as the majority of the team members including president Ramirez are underclassmen.

With only a few upperclassmen, the team's young and novice boxers are only beginning to discover that there's more to this sport than punching.

"When I'm fighting a kid, I'm not there to destroy him," Herrera said. "I feel like it's more like the analogy of a chess match: where I have to figure where his mistakes are, and I have to find it and exploit it."

Undoubtedly, boxing is physically taxing. Competitors prepare for matches through intense fight training at the San Jose Police Athletic League Gym. There, the team is able to work with coach Candy Lopez, former U.S. Olympic boxing coach. The multipurpose room allows for review of basic fundamentals, such as throwing a punch, hand placement and footwork. The San Jose PAL Gym's boxing ring, a necessity Santa Clara lacks, gives boxers an opportunity to practice live sparring.

In addition to the strenuous sparring sessions that preclude the many anticipated matches, the boxers must concern themselves with a strict diet, often in an attempt to lose weight in order to compete at a lower weight class.

Freshman Joey Lopez says, "When I am dieting, it's salad and chicken breast for six to eight weeks at a time ... yet the most satisfying thing is eating that cheeseburger right after the fight."

As with many of the other fighters, cutting weight is a possibility. Lopez weighs about 165 pounds, and can cut his weight down as low as 145 pounds, which is up to a 20 pound loss within a week of a match.

However, desperate dieting to be eligible and fight in an ideal weight class is a low priority for Ramirez, who said: "the next morning- you feel like a train ran you over- you get sore, your shoulders, your legs, your face hurts sometimes, your jaw hurts."

Though there are many hardships inherent to the journey that the boxing team will face this season, the sense of a family bond makes the training, dieting and day-after-soreness all worth it.

"When you're fighting, you don't want to let your coach down, you don't want to let your teammates down, you don't want to let your fans down, it's kind of for them," Ramirez said.

"You don't want to let yourself down either, but for the most part, you just fight for the people that are cheering you on, you want to show them that you can and that you will."

Within a month's time, the team will have fought their first tournament together in Reno, returning to show their fans that the boxing team has the spirit and dedication to win at the Dodge Ackerman Memorial tournament Feb. 25.