Sharla, boxing gyms in our area?

[Sharla]

Is this Dave from the Cove gym here in SA?

I completely thought you were someone else last time you posted!

Yes i did think you knew what you were talking about and your son is pretty damn tricky - in a good, talented way of course!

I haven't been around the scene much recently to hear how people are going.

Hope everything in your neck of the woods is going well! I hear the guys nationals are getting close - I hope if you have anyone entered this year they do well.

Apparently it's an even smaller team than usual this year?

[Sharla]

Hi John,

Yeah as I have said I can recommend the cove gym. I have to admit i have been away from the scene for a few months. I'm not sure of who has other heavyweights to spar with at the present time.

The glenelg club had a guy who could compete as a light heavy last year but I've heard he hasn't been at state trainings this year so i don't know if he's still there.

I would just visit all of these different clubs and make it clear that you are just checking out a few places so they don't feel like you are their guy immediately.

Having some foundation in the sport may come with it's own BS meter as far as who seems to have the tools to coach you the way you need to be coached.

At the same time some coaches will jump at the chance to take you on because you may already be at a stage where you can be good for sparring etc but some of the same coaches would not have had the structure or the effort or passion for the sport to nuture you from the beginning.

I think most would have had that passion at one stage but some will have lost it and I feel you don't want to be battling the consequences of a coach who is gradually loosing his passion for the sport all together.

Ask about the structure of their trainings. Some places will be stricter than others and some will not have enough structure. Think about how often you want different aspects of your training.

Perhaps ask if they have any fight vids on hand of their current and recent fighters. I think that will be some indication for you. Coaches who don't have fight vids you can watch either have something to hide or they don't follow up on the performance of their athletes with a structured logical training plan enough to bother or to be interested enough to make the effort of getting the vids.

At your age I suspect you have some obligations or anticipate having some obligations as far as employment or study is concerned. This means you will want to be able to train in hours which fit in with that. Some places will have training times very difficult for people who work nine to five to attend.

Also ask how they feel about interclub sparring and boxing SA in general. I think you want a coach who may recoginize ways in which boxing SA might be improved but one who still has the ability to work with it as best as possible.

You do not want to miss out on interclub sparring and to deal with political issues just because your coach can not stop fighting with all the other coaches. Interclub sparring may also be a huge benefit to your development so even if the coach you choose doesn't approve of some aspects of Boxing SA you want to see evidence of a continued effort to work with oter clubs to get this.

Many places will have rare sporadic interclub sparring but sometimes that's just not enough. Especially if you find as a heavyweight you don't have to opportunity to spar people your weight often. SA is not a huge boxing state as I am sure you are aware so you really need to work with every resource you have to have much hope of being competitive with opponents interstate. Ask how often they travel to compete also.

I intend to look around myself in a few weeks once i have finished a pressing dealine i have for uni work but i am prepared to accept that this may also just be a bad time to be looking. Some clubs including some of the good ones will have an off season and be winding down towards Christmas soon. You don't neccessarily want to miss out on training with them if they would be right for you.

So yeah look around, let me know how it goes but don't commit to any one place too quickly as exciting as it can be and good luck!

[Sharla]

Yeah last thing i knew (no really up to date knowledge) there were only a few half good Muay Thai boxing places.

Some of them have a reputation for being a bit rough and ready in a couple of ways.

1) There are often huge mismatches in kickboxing bouts and you would find you usually win too easily or are defeated in a dangerous, physically damaging fashion. There is less in between partially because of the nature of the sport and partially because of the types of clubs.

I've seen some brutal matches where a girl who was a real athlete and had spent far longer training than competing was paired against a novice for a bout with knees. On paper they may have looked similar but in reality it was a mismatch and i think it took less than a minute for the novice girl to be completely obliterated with about 8 consecutive hard knees to the midsection.

I wouldn't want that kind of mismatched empty victory at the expense of a novice's organs and i wouldn't want to be the one in the novice club thrown to the wolves.

Baring in mind this is what can happen with a small female bout where they have less muscle and body weight to use against each other. I can tell you i can get punched by most girls my weight ten times and not really feel it much. A heavier person will have me watching their jab like a hawk. Small women's bouts are often fast and high scoring because what we can dish out to each other is less damaging.

It was bare knee bone and a lack of the basic ability to move out the way which dropped this girl. If it was a bigger guy fighting the damage would be bigger so as a heavyweight i'd be especially safety conscious. In your own gym you'll be the bigger one but in a bout matched up against another heavy weight you should be especially careful of who you trust to find you matches and put you into compete.

2) Some of the big places are known for being more into toughness and the coaches have a reputation of being more into physical discipline. I've heard of things like the coach publically slapping his fighters around straight after a bout out of dissappointment over a loss.

I couldn't put up with that personally - i know some would respond well to it but I'd just want to tell him to F**k off! I also think there is something wrong with a coach who will put 100 % of the responsibility for a win or loss on te fighter. A good coach accepts that they help to prepare their fighter and responsibility comes with that.

If you wanted to go into Muay Thai i'd generally suggest getting a good boxing foundation in a boxing gym first because especially in SA boxing coaches are going to be better at showing you how to box. It's logical really since they specialize in boxing and put 100 % of their efforts into that.

Kickboxing in SA seems to use fewer angles and bouts are sometimes just down to who can handle the punishment more but you're less likely to get badly hurt is you are already taught to use boxing angles i think.

Plus because you're not kicking or blocking with your legs you'll learn to move around the ring more and use distancing so if you bring in the legs with that base hopefully you'll use them more efficiently.

I started in kickboxing and went to boxing and i think life would be easier the opposite way around. I think it'd be a LOT safer too!

Thanks for the birthday wishes and let us know how you go!

[pikey dave]

yeah ,sharla its dave. we have mostly juniors at the moment,but a couple of bigger [nice] guys for sparring. not sure about the rest of boxing s.a. i'm not into politics , too many egos. how are you? hope all is going well, dave osbourn.

[Sharla]

Good thanks Dave

I think boxing SA is very political but I guess what i meant was it's easier to get the most of out interclub sparring etc if you don't have blow ups or fights with anyone.

Easier to avoid POing any of the egos and just to focus on the training.

So is your club looking at winding down over Christmas or is training still going strong?