All the fighters from our exhibition a couple of weeks ago got medals for participating. I can hang my medal up next to my Dad's boxing trophy. He won the 147 pound division Golden Gloves in Michigan City in 1940. He was a scrapper - even fought a couple of pro fights. When I started fooling around with boxing he showed me how to wrap my hands and gave me a little advice. I never got too involved because I was married and going to college but like most things my brothers and I were involved in, he always supported and encouraged us. If he were still around, he would've had his 89th birthday the day before the fights. He would have really enjoyed being there.
The video is the second round of Shop Teacher Bob versus "Brent the Bruiser". I'm in the white shirt and red trunks. Watch for the "Holmes Hammer" at the start of the round - it's a big overhand right. It wasn't part of the script but one of the other fighters hollered for it so I turned it loose. "Fun for the whole family" - yeah, buddy!
Busy, busy weekend. I went to Belfast, New York to the Bare Knuckle Boxing Hall of Fame annual induction ceremony. They were featuring trainers this year and yours truly was honored with special recognition for having trained there last September and the coach/teacher thing. I was both humbled and honored to accept the recognition. I did feel a little out of place, however. There were four former world champions and several former and current title contenders in the crowd. The little contribution I've made to the boxing game doesn't really amount to that much but I accepted the award on behalf of myself and all the other guys who are or have been doing the same thing. Jimmy gave me a nice little introduction and Scott Burt from the BKBHF presented me with a pair of Indian clubs with the Hall of Fame logo inset into them.
It was very nice and I really appreciate the recognition for what I've done. I've now had my 15 minutes worth of fame.
We left for Belfast Friday morning for the long drive and even though my ass was getting sore about the time I was crossing into Pennsylvania, it was also about the time my retirement became official. That in itself was enough to put a smile on my face the whole weekend. After the induction breakfast on Saturday morning, Jimmy and Tim "The Bleeder" from our gym put on a little boxing exhibition for the crowd with Tim living up to his Bleeder moniker. Belfast was also celebrating their Irish heritage with their Festival Days. Jimmy's band, Double Vision, played for the street dance and volunteered their equipment for the talent contest. For a small town there's no shortage of talent.
Sunday morning Livingstone Bramble and Billy Backus, both former world champions, narrated fight films of their world title fights. Absolutely incredible that two former world champions showed up in this little town and people had the opportunity to watch the fight footage with them and ask questions about the fights. No big crowd to contend with. There were photos available that they were happy to sign for you. (Myself, I had all the heavy hitters autograph my invitation to the event. That's going to get framed.) Both of the former champions were extremely nice and seemed to feel at home in Belfast. That town just seems to have that effect on people.
There was also the 5K Ramble with Bramble run/walk on Sunday morning. Tim's goal was to beat Bramble in the run. He accomplished that but Monday he was so stiff and sore it took him about 5 minutes to get out of the truck every time we stopped. I was the male "race walk" winner. There was only one fast walker in the group and she and I walked together for the last half of the race. It felt good to be able to compete again, such as it was. My time was about a minute quicker than the one I did right before I had the heart attack. I walked about as fast as I could go without breaking into the silly race walker mode. I got a chance to see Annie at the race, which was nice. She was the young lady who ran with Jimmy last September when we were training there. She's training for another marathon in October, bless her pretty little heart.
Sunday afternoon was spent at Pollywogg Holler. Double Vision played all afternoon and everyone had a great time. The weather was great, the music was great, the people were great. It looks like the band will be back next year again.
Tim and I slept in the barns again this year. I only heard one unexplainable noise this year, unlike all the crazy things we heard in September when we were there. Apparently the ghosts are comfortable with us spending nights in the barns. This year they added a statue of William Muldoon to the grounds to complement the statue of John L. Sullivan that's there. If you are a boxing fan, you owe it to yourself to show up out there in Belfast for induction weekend.
Tim and I headed out early on Monday for the ten hour trip back home. We were pulling the U-Haul with all the band equipment so now I can add Roadie to my resume. The trip was certainly one for the books and I'm extremely grateful to Jimmy and Scot Burt for my special recognition. The people of Belfast were great, like always, and the boxers were an inspiration to all of the young fighters like Tim.
On a completely different note, if any of you weldors out there are looking for a teaching job in the Midwest, I got this in an e-mail this morning: Byron Ernest, the principle of Emmerich Manual H.S. in Indianapolis, is looking for a full-time welding instructor. If you’re interested, contact him at bernest@emmerichmanualhs.org .
The Lone Wolf things used to be pretty popular. J.C. Whitney/Warshawsky used to sell license plates and jackets with the logo on the back if I remember correctly. While the No Club thing was referring to car clubs, I'm going to go no club meaning boxing club. Since my running buddy came down with the cooties and the weather's going to cool down, I think it's time for me to just train on my own. While that's not near as much fun, I've done it before.
While training for the marathon my running buddy at the high school bailed out when we were scheduled to run 12 miles in temperatures of only about 4 degrees with about 4" of fresh snow on the ground. Can't really blame him but I soldiered on and continued my training. Way back when I was boxing I did almost all my road work solo due to my work schedule. It's much more enjoyable having a running buddy - my buddy Kevin and I had some great conversations while putting in the miles - and having a partner kept me honest but with this damn virus, my chest issue and advanced age, I'm thinking it's all me now.
I hit my fighting weight when I got back from my bike ride yesterday morning. I weighed in at 178. Left the house a heavyweight and came home a light heavy. The last time I was that weight was right before I ran the marathon 15 years ago. I weighed 165 when I graduated from high school and 165 when I got married a few years later. I got up to over 200 maybe twenty years ago. I was still in half-assed decent shape but definitely had a belly. The belly's smaller now but I don't have the muscle mass I used to so even though I've lost about five pounds this year still got a bit of a belly. However, my resting heartrate and blood pressure are good so I've managed the quarantine fairly well.
The plan now is to get the trainer set up down the basement again, add some more strength training and get outside this winter and do some hiking, skating and maybe even some snow shoeing depending on the weather. I would like to glove up at least one more time. I really miss going to the gym. Here I am from right after we started the boxing club: https://shopteacherbob.blogspot.com/search?q=Boxing+Exhibition. I was probably 190 pounds that night and 59 years old. Fun for the whole family!
It's been real busy around here lately. The boxing gym is bursting at the seams. We took some guys to fights on Wednesday and Saturday. Wednesday night we had one exhibition fight and one match. The exhibition had our kid up against a much more experienced fighter. The other guy held back just the right amount to give our guy some good work in front of a crowd and made it a good show for the spectators. Our other fighter won handily by a decision. It was his third fight and he's looking a lot better than when he first started. It was his opponent's first fight. The guy was a gamer but he was no match for "Bazooka Joe". I forgot to take my camera along. I could have gotten some good shots of the fighters and the card girls as well. They were a couple of cuties.
Saturday we went to Indy and things didn't go real well there. Our first fighter up was in the ring for the first time and fought really well. He lost by decision but if he had busied it up a little more in the third round, he might have been able to pull it off. He kept his composure and looked pretty sharp for his first time. A lot of guys forget everything you ever told them when they get in there. The second fighter got robbed, plain and simple. I don't usually complain about the decisions but this one was just plain wrong. Our guy easily won the first two rounds. His opponent received two standing eight counts in the second round and he was basically just getting the snot pounded out of him. The third round, our fighter eased up but the other guy didn't throw much either. I wasn't the only person who questioned the decision, either. Everyone in the crowd thought the same thing. That's how it is in the old boxing game, sometimes.
We do have some real good talent coming to the gym now. Even though the ones who've fought didn't always win, they all fought well and looked sharp doing it. We're going to be able to field some good fighters in the future. We've got a bunch of young guys coming to the gym and we're going to have a real nice facility when we finish our expansion. I think we'll be able to put on a pretty good showing at this year's Golden Gloves.
We had another boxing show/fundraiser for the gym Saturday night. All the newly painted chairs looked pretty good in there. We had a sell-out crowd again and most of the matches were paired up pretty well. Big Dave fought a guy about half his size but took it real easy on him. I went against a young guy who just wouldn't stop coming at me. I showed a little bit of my potential in the first round and let him throw a few at me in the second. I told Jimmy to have the kid go easy the last round and we would work on a couple of things. Of course, Jimmy told him to turn it up on me. He managed to sneak in a couple of shots and gave me a little something to remember him by. Kind of a crappy picture but the do it yourself photo session at 11:30 (photo taken Sat. night) was about all I could muster up. Like all shiners, they take a couple of days to really look their best anyway. We took a picture of Ernie, Jimmy and myself after Monday's workout and sparring session that's a real doozy. Jimmy just got a mouse under his eye from sparring, Ernie's nose is bright red from some nice uppercuts, and I'm sporting a two day old shiner from Sat's exhibition. All of us with big grins and battle scars. The things guys do for fun!
That's going to be it for me boxing. I shouldn't have been in there anyway with my previous head injury. I'm definitely going to miss it. Anyway, the gym is doing well, I've got about 25 more chairs to paint and the van to start working on. I'm going to have one of the boys at school put a rack together for the medicine balls as soon as I get a moment to draw up a sketch and we still need to get the chin-up bar mounted. Always lots to do.
We had a show at the gym Saturday night. It was an in house show to raise a little money for our travel expenses for the upcoming Golden Gloves tourney and to give the fighters a little experience in front of a crowd. Plus, what's the use of putting all that time in at the gym if you don't get a chance to fight? We had ten bouts and in spite of the weather, a full house. The show was covered by Bolo Punch Boxing. They have an internet broadcast every Thursday at 8:00 pm Central Time so you should hear about the show there. Mr. Guzman also served as the ring announcer and did a real fine job. He also helped us out with our signs and he's painting a mural for us on the gym wall. Local boxing legend Jack Callahan refereed the bouts and he too did a real fine job. Jack also helped us out with the training when Jimmy had foot surgery and couldn't get around. We taped the fights, so as soon as things get transferred to a computer, I should be able to get a short video clip here of some of the action. You might even be able to see Shop Teacher Bob in action!
The bouts were all real good. Two fighters came in from the outside and they apparently hadn't gotten the memo that it was an exhibition. Our man Vince took a few lumps but rose to the occasion and gave it his all. The other outsider took on our man Ernie and Ernie showed him a few things. For a couple of super heavyweights, there was a lot of action. Lots of combinations being thrown and Ernie was real tight on his defense. When he got inside he threw some real nice body shots and hooks. Ernie should do real well this year at the Gloves.
All in all, I'd have to say our first event was a tremendous success. As Jimmy says: "Fun for the whole family".
Several of my students took the Film Literature class this year. The final project for the class is the making of a short film. One of the boys who is in my welding class and also a fighter at the gym, made a boxing video. You can view it here. It features him and Coach Jimmy. It's a little schmaltzy but check out Jimmy when he's hitting the heavy bag. I had to work his corner at one of his fights because his main coach was out of town. I was really hoping he didn't get cut or hurt and I'd have to deal with it. As it turned out, he nailed the guy with one of those big shots to the body early and his opponent just crumpled. Man, he hits hard.
We had another exhibition at the gym Saturday night, also. When we get the DVDs burned, I'll throw something up here. Lot's of fun.
The boxing gym won the Health and Fitness category in the parade two weeks ago. We got a nice trophy out of the deal and some good press. I can't take any of the credit, this was Jimmy's baby all the way. I drove the truck but that's pretty much a no brainer. The gym is going real well and we're talking about maybe expanding in the not too distant future. We've got an exhibition scheduled for October 3rd and Jimmy is fighting in November.
