Boxing clubs give the opportunity to kids and teenagers to have something to do on their spare time. Instead of them out on the streets, they are in the gym training for their next match.  These teenagers train long hours and go through a lot of sacrifice with their eating habits. Although, they can’t eat what they want, they eat healthy so that they can fight. The fighters do everything to get the requirements done for their fights coming up. Some boxing clubs are, The Central Coast Boxing Club, and The Balderas School of Boxing and many others around the community. Some students at Pioneer Valley who are dedicating their selves to boxing because they have a passion for the sport. Boxing is a sport where teenagers and people in general get to relieve stress, anger, and pain they have, out into a bag or a fight.

Something difficult in Boxing: “Its an individual sport, so if you lose you cant blame it on other people, it all you. It also takes a lot of training and heart to do the sport and train for many hours a day.”
Some challenges throughout this career: “Losing weight, for every fight, I have lose like 20lbs, cause I go from 140lbs to maybe 120lbs sometimes 125lbs, going through loses against people who I knew I can beat, but I just had like a bad mindset of it and underestimating my opponents.”
Some things they do for training/practices:” I run a lot, I usually have to run like 3 miles a day, sometimes 4 if I feeling it, I train for a lot of hours, from like 4:30-7:30 sometimes 8:00, and eat healthy because I cant eat what I want.”
Support from Parents:” I get a good amount, not as much as I wanted, but I accept the fact that they don’t like the sport I’m doing that much, but I just go for what I love, because that’s just me.”
Motivation: “To motivate myself before a fight, I’ll go out and say “hi” to my family, to my grandparents, to my own parents and I just think if I win this fight, I’ll make them proud and if I lose hopefully I’ll still make them proud a little for fighting. I just look at my family and make them proud.”
How does it feel to get punched in the face?: “For me personally, not that bad because when I fight, I fight at a lower weight, so not that bad, but during sparing its vs. older people, it hurts, but I just go through the pain and just do it.”

Something difficult in Boxing: “Some difficulties in Boxing are that some days you’ll get discouraged, for example, some days you’ll spare and you get beat, you feel discouraged or sometimes if you lose your fight you’ll feel like “why am I even doing this?” but you have to think “today may not be my day but tomorrow it will!”
Some challenges throughout this career: “Even though I’ve only had 1 fight, some challenges are the weight cutting and you know there are some days you don’t feel like going, but those are the days you need to go because those are the days that get you more motivated.”
Some things they do for training/practices: “During training it varies, so sometimes we do sparing, ring work, bag work, mitts, speed bags, running, it just depends, usually varies between person and person, but its usually mainly just a consist of sparing, bag work, mitts, and technique.”
Support from Parents: “My parents worry and my friends worry too, but they know I enjoy it and they know I’m going to put the effort in and if they know I’m putting effort in, they’ll say “okay you know what I support you”.”
Motivation: “Before a fight, to motivate myself I just really think of all the work I’ve put in for the fight, I completely clear my head and just think of all the people that are supporting me, also maybe listen to music to really think about all that
How does it feel to get punched in the face?: “Honestly getting hit in the face is not as bad as you think, I’d honestly would rather get hit in the face 10x, then get 1 really good shot to the body because those shots to the body are the ones that get you tired.”

Diana has been boxing since she was in elem elementary school

Something difficult in Boxing: ” I feel like its mainly your mindset and the way you see things because if you have a weak mindset your not going to fight at your full potential and its going to be easier for you to just give up and in boxing you just have you go at it. After a couple minutes, your arms just get tired and you feel like you can’t lift them up and your face starts feeling numb, but that’s when you don’t give up and keep going.”
Some challenges throughout this career: ” Everyday, because we would go from Monday-Friday to practices, and some days you wouldn’t want to and some days you’d be tired because it was right after school. I would go from 3:40-8 pm, and you’d just be so worn out and the car rides over there you would just be sleepy and it would feel like once you get there your there and you have to give your all again and come back the next day and that would be pretty tough sometimes.”
Some things they do for training/practices: ” When we get there it was mainly just warming up. Some days it would just be the bags and other days it was leg days, we would be doing the stairs going up and down, and we would also use the weight going up and down with them, and also doing your squats. From there we would go to the bags and the coaches would give you number and different codes for you to hit the bag, then we would spare with other people and sometimes even with the coach. After that we would just run for an hour around the gym and the cemetery.”
Support from Parents: ” I would since at the time I couldn’t drive so they would be the ones taking me and they would pay for my stuff and there would be some days I wouldn’t want to go and they would make me go.”
Motivation: ” Some days when I didn’t want to be there and I would have to be there I would just be like ” well your already here so try to make the most of it”
How does it feel to get punched in the face?: ” Well personally I like it because I’ve always been like trying different sports like soccer, and basketball, and with those sports there wouldn’t be as much contact, and I didn’t like, but once I started boxing I feel like it was better for me because I was able to hit and I was able to get hit so a punch was a good feeling sometimes unless it was constantly then it would bug me.”

Andres trains at Balderas Boxing Gym with PV juniors Leo Vazquez and Manny Gonzalez

Something difficult in Boxing: ” The training is pretty intense and the workout we do are not easy, there difficult, and some are extreme I guess.”
Some challenges throughout this career: ” The workouts are a challenge for me, also another challenge would be the other people, like trying to keep up with them, or like when you spare them they are your challenge.”
Some things they do for training/practices: ” We focus a lot on, when we workout together as a gym, we work on legs and also ab workouts but mainly our legs because we need a lot of condition since we do a lot of leg movement. Also the arms too, especially the shoulders because they get tired sometimes too.”
Support from Parents: ” Not really, they don’t tell me anything, they just take me to go boxing and that’s it I just go to my room.”
Motivation: ” Someone who better then me in there is what motivates me because I see them and there like that good and I see that I can be like them or even better, and just I my head just improve, improve, and improve
How does it feel to get punched in the face?: ” Some of them can be unexpected, because you don’t expect that person to hit that hard and it depends too because sometimes it can be a clean shot which can hurt.”

Something difficult in Boxing: “We train for 2 hours and running is hard since we barley got started on the running unit.”
Some challenges throughout this career: “If the other opponent is stronger than me and it hurts a lot since they are better.”
Some things they do for training/practices: “Running, Sparing, Workouts and hitting a bag for like half hour.”
Support from Parents: “Yeah my parents take me to the place all the time.”
Motivation: “My friends help motivate me.”
How does it feel to get punched in the face?: “yeah it hurts a lot.”

Something difficult in Boxing: “Some difficulties in Boxing for me would be fighting someone like in the ring because you never know what to expect so you have to keep your eyes up”
Some challenges throughout this career: ” Some challenges would have to be probably keeping up with them because they are all so fit and experienced and me being not that good as them. They would also have very good strategies and I guess I had to come up with mine and be really quick”
Some things they do for training/practices: “We would have this timer and that timer would go off like every 2 minutes and within those 2 minutes we would be doing like different positions like a 1, 2, 3 on the bags, mountain climbers, jumping jacks, and just basic training and exercising”
Support from Parents: ” I did, my mom wanted me to learn self defense and she’s like the type to not let me do those type of physical stuff, she’s like “I’m a lady and you need to do lady things” but the fact that this would help me with self defense she was working on it”
Motivation: ” To motivate myself, I think for me was just being fit, being healthy and knowing that I could actually hit somebody back like in defense but not out of the ring because then I would get in trouble but mostly just keeping myself safe”
How does it feel to get punched in the face?: ” You’d think it feel soft because of the glove but it not, you have your wrap under it and then depending on how much strength your putting on to your leg and arm, its going to be a hard hit, so I’d have to say its not that fun”