Boxing Gym Spotlight: Chris Edwards Hits It Hard At Impact

**With Slideshow**

© Jane Warburton / Saddo Boxing

On Friday, January 23, 2009, at the Fenton Manor Sports Complex in Stoke-On-Trent, England, Frank Maloney and Impact Boxing will be staging an exciting fight night for the Stoke fans which sees local-man Chris Edwards topping the bill.

Entitled ‘Stoking the Fire’ – it will be a double-whammy for Edwards as he takes a drop in weight to challenge for the British and Commonwealth Flyweight titles.

His opponent – Grimsby boxer Wayne Bloy – hasn’t fought since his loss to Andy Bell 12 months ago, ironically, the same Andy Bell that Edwards lost to last time out.

SaddoBoxing went along to the Impact Boxing Gym in Fenton, Stoke-on-Trent, today to see how Edwards was shaping up.

A small guy, but with a big grin, Edwards was clearly fired-up and ready to go when I asked how he was feeling about his title shot. “I’m excited, I‘m really looking forward to it and I just want to get in there now.” the likable Stoke man enthused.

“I’ve been training hard here at the gym and then doing swimming and fitness at the local centre, only allowing myself two days off over Christmas. It’s great to be fighting in Fenton – I’ve not fought there before and last time I fought in Stoke was more than two years ago. I’ve been checking out Bloy’s ‘form’ and I think it should make for a great fight.”

Having taken a couple of photographs, I stand to one side while trainer Lindon Newbon gives instruction to his ’charge’, before Edwards begins power-skipping.

“Training has gone very well,” Lindon begins, “we’ve concentrated on a lot of fitness conditioning and he‘s done quite a bit of running. Chris does 12 rounds of conditioning in the morning, a five mile run in the afternoon and between 6-12 rounds of sparring at night intermingled with weight sessions. His last full training session will be Friday.”

At that, Lindon jumps in to the ring with Edwards and they do several rounds on the pads. Edwards is fast and moved around so much I couldn’t get a face-on picture of him!

After the pads session, Edwards moves on to the punch bags. Pounding away – he works at three different bags. Sweat dripping from his face and his track-suit soaked, Edwards does his final session – a gruelling ‘circuit’ which included press-ups, sit-ups and stomach-crunchers using the medicine ball – with each ‘set’ interrupted by a run up and down the gym carrying a 25 kilo [55 pound] ‘bag’.

The stomach-crunchers particularly looked like agony and Lindon encourages Edwards by reminding him that this will be the last of these sessions in preparation for his fight night. Edwards looks relieved when it’s over – but he’s worked hard and is obviously in great shape.

Impact Boxing’s Scott Lawton, Jimmy Doherty, Alex Ibbs and Scott Miller will also be on the Fenton fight-card.