As the story has it, one day I headed to the opposite side of the globe – the Flipside. I arrived in Korea February 16th, 2005 and thought I’d do a year, then leave. I was wrong. I stayed, launched my first company, Flipside Fitness, and then opened Korea's largest boxing club, Hulk's Boxing (now called Hulk's Club).

After 11.5yrs in Korea, I then picked up one day and returned to Toronto, Canada. But then I left again.

Now I live in the Philippines where I am the CEO and head coach of Empowered Clubhouse, the Philippines' first and only boxing clubhouse exclusively just for women. I also am the founder of the Lil' Sistas Project, CEO and designer of Slay Gear and Baa Baa Black Sheep .Ph.

Tuesday, May 23, 2017

Sparring with Rocky... Tuesday, May 23

Walked into Elorde today and was told my coach had changed my sparring partner.

"You're sparring with Rocky today", he said.

I looked at Coach Rocky sitting there, he smiled, then I turned to get ready for warmup.  Sparring with Coach Rocky, great, he's going to kill me.  Rocky is a shorter boxer, probably a little taller than me, but they all praise him for supposedly his mad skills and hard hits.  I haven't actually seen him spar before but I see the intensity he brings to coaching his fighters.  He flys those pads by their heads, firing off combo after combo, and he does it with such a straight face.  Unlike Coach Garry who comments when I land a solid punch or repeat a combo he's taught me, Coach Rocky doesn't say anything.  His face doesn't even say anything either, he's emotion-less in the facial expressions and I think that throws a lot of his fighters off.  He only cracks a smile when he says "hi" or "bye" to me.  And though he seems like a nice guy, he's emotionless when he coaches and pretty much talks as little as he can.

Ya... I was stepping into the ring with him.

Coach Rocky is a former Filipino champion so I guess he doesn't need to talk or show emotion, his boxing status speaks for itself.

Upon stepping into the ring with Coach Rocky, many of the other boxers at the club and those working either came to watch ringside or stopped where they were to watch for a bit.

No pressure, oh gosh.

My plan of attack was to figure out what his weakness was and really focus on that.  BINGO, found it in the first round.  Coach Garry noted it too and we quickly chatted about it in between rounds.  Rocky often keeps his guard high but he's quick to react to me throwing body shots at him.  He doesn't however keep his guard tight and so I worked the upper cut like it was my golden ticket to staying afloat in these six rounds of sparring.

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