Some athletes in Hamilton got a lesson from a boxing pro on Sunday.
Ryan Rozicki is a professional boxer with a record of 20 wins and 1 loss. Rozicki has won several regional titles and fought in the WBC International Cruiser division.
But on Sunday he was teaching some old-school tricks to some up-and-coming boxers.
Ryan Rozicki, a 29-year-old, has been boxing for 14 years. He turned to the sport to transform a negative experience into a positive one.
“I was a bit of a trouble maker so I had to get into a sport to kind of keep me out of trouble,” says Rozicki.
The professional boxer was born in Cape Breton, Nova Scotia but now calls Hamilton home.
He is currently one of the top boxers in Canada and is ranked number one with the World Boxing Council.
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While some came to the event for fun, others like Corson McDonald, an amateur boxer, hope to make a career out of it and follow in Ryan’s footsteps one day.
“Feels great, I love his style of fighting, I watch him he’s one of my favorite fighters to watch and I think I can gain a lot of his knowledge,” said McDonald.
Rozicki says if you’re interested in a career in boxing, one of the things you have to be willing to do is take a punch, or at least avoid one.
“You might lose, you have to be aware, it’s not always going to go your way in a fight, there is going to be a lot of lows, but you have to be mentally taught to be able to get back up,” says Rozicki.
Sunday’s event was also a fundraiser for Neighbour to Neighbour, a local charity that helps battle food insecurity in Hamilton. They collected just over 500 dollars in donations.
“When you have someone on the higher end of boxing, and to be able to give the community someone like that is very special, it’s special to have someone of his caliber and they are going to learn a few things,” says Three Lions Promotions Manager, Daniel Otter.
Ryan will be fighting next in Miami at the end of May when he takes on the world boxing champion.
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