Beat Rush

When you see your limit and you break it.
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My brother David and I left South Austin Gym where we attended a Capital City Heroes Boxing Show. We wanted to see what a coordinated boxing match would look like as well as possible competitors he may be up against next Spring when he wants to have his first official match.

We walked into a long line of attendees of family and fans and the smell of popcorn and punching bag nylon in the air. There were competitors of all ages (6+) getting suited up and words of encouragement from their families, mostly mothers, on the floor with the rest of the audience. It was dark, except for the training area and the boxing ring itself.

After seeing the fighters mercilessly pummel each other in hopes for their arm raised in victory, we walked outside with the bright lights hitting you like after going to a movie. I sensed there was some hesitation by the lack of jokes we would usually be cracking after a spectacle like we just saw.

I broke the silence. “So, do you think you could hack it?”

“Yeah.” He responded with meek confidence.

“What makes you nervous?” I asked.
He laughed. “Getting my ass beat.”

I wanted to see more of what training for something like this would entail. I noticed there were different approaches each fighter used, going from fast and furious to calculated and deliberate, and I was curious as to what David’s was.

“We train pretty early, if you’re up to coming to one of my one-on-one sessions.” He mentioned on the ride home. Being accustomed to waking up as early as 3:30 AM for a part time barista gig, I was okay with it.

It was night and day with how the gym looked at 5 AM compared to what it looked like during the boxing show the previous day. There was nobody there except Zach, David’s trainer. The lights were bright and fluorescent, and the smell of concessions faded leaving a damp and musky odor. The gym looked a lot bigger, more factory-like without the fold-out metal chairs covering the entire floor replaced with rubber mats.

David immediately started warm-up drills as soon as he was suited up in gym shorts, t-shirt, and boxing shoes. They moved around the gym starting with footwork in the center of the room and progressing to the various amounts of punching bags framing the walls. Zach would interject now and then to demonstrate jabbing techniques for him to try. My own stamina was dwindling with how intense the workout looked, and I wasn’t even participating.

They made their way back to the foldout wooden tables where they had the sparring gear laid out.

“Okay, it’s time for actual sparring now.” David signaled me with widened eyes, anticipating that the workout was about to get kicked up a few notches.

David and Zach suited up in their gear, Zach adding a groin guard to his mix.

David stepped up the stairs at the corner of the ring, pushing down the middle of the ropes to make his way inside.

First, there was some jabs being thrown to the air circling around a cone, and shortly after, the cone was moved, and Zach stepped into its place.

I made my way around the ring for pictures, careful about where I would rest my arms on the floor of the ring after seeing dried remnants of unidentifiable fluids and solids in each corner.

During the actual spar, David would practice the punch and jab combinations he was taught while also making sure to keep his defense up. At some points, Zach would sneak in hits anytime he saw a vulnerable opening. One was hard enough to knock out one of David’s contact lenses onto the floor.

While watching them make their coverage around the ring , I wondered about the different avenues people take when starting a new physical endeavor.

People turn to physical activity for catharsis, which is not very interesting on its own. What’s interesting is the choice of physical activity and the reasonings behind it. General health and weight loss or conditioning may be the goal, but there’s usually something even behind that reasoning. Something impactful.

David went through every step of that thought process in a span of five years, toiling over what he could do to alleviate the stress of working in the high ranks of the University of Texas’s President’s Office, and also the after effects of being in an emotionally abusive relationship with an alcoholic.

David felt himself closing off into himself, feeling constricted without a voice, letting things progress with little adjustments to see what could help. After choosing to end the relationship, he found boxing in 2017.

Other influences include watching boxing in Ecuador when he was in the Peace Corps, as well as his video game idol, Tifa Lockhart from the Final Fantasy series.

There was a transformation made from 2017 to the present, and his family could see it. There was a newfound confidence and a stronger voice, body, and soul.

The buzzer rang and the spar match was over. David was at the end of his session that morning, and it was obvious with how drenched in sweat both of them were. I had the opportunity to talk to his trainer before his next client.

“The heaviest piece of equipment here is that front door,” Zach mentioned to me after the sparring. “You have to open it and a lot of people don’t want to come through that door, it weighs 1000 lbs. David comes in, though.”