Markeshia Ricks Photo
Gary Smikle pulled 13-year-old Sharmaine Donaldson out of the lineup. He swiped a punching mitt at her. Donaldson stepped back, but she never took her eyes off of him. She didn’t blink. She didn’t lose her fighting stance. She did not flinch or close her eyes.
She didn’t flinch or close her eyes.
There were a few flinchers and eye closers at Elephant In The Room, the after-school Dixwell refuge started by former boxer Devonne “Da Bomb” Canady and Smikle, her former trainer.
Smikle took a handful of students one afternoon this week through a series of warm-ups and boxing drills designed to teach them the basics of boxing. This day’s lesson: How to keep their eyes open when a punch is coming. A lesson for the ring. And for life.
Flincher Spotted
“Step up. Step back,” Smikle said to the students, who lined up in front of him with their balled fists held close to their chins. “Step up. Step back.”
Smikle added a ducking movement, then a jab to the sequence.
The shuffling sound of their feet across the mats of the gym accompanied their movements. Experienced students like Donaldson moved quickly, efficiently. Those who were less familiar with the movement? Not so much. The students, some boys, some girls, were of varying heights and weights.
When Smikle stood up and grabbed a pair of punching mitts, the drill separated the flinchers from the non-flinchers. With Canady, and more advanced boxers looking on, Smikle stepped up to each student.
Then he took a swing at them. The mitt swiped mere inches in front of their noses. The students knew to step back, to avoid a direct hit.
Smikle took a swipe at the smallest student. The boy stepped back — but also closed his eyes, anticipating a blow he was not interested in seeing land. If he were in a real match, he’d likely have been on the floor, the left jab he intended, never unleashed. He was a flincher.
You can always tell the newest boxers in the group, Smikle said. They close their eyes when they see a hand coming toward their faces. Flinching, or closing one’s eyes, is a natural reaction for someone with no experience taking a punch with eyes open.
Smikle sought to correct that for the flinching student in Tuesday night’s group. He pulled him out of the line up and made him do the sequence over again, correcting his form, while the other students looked on. Smikle’s son, Daine, was coaching from the wings. Daine told the little boy, “Don’t take your eyes off his.”
It clicked.
The boy widened his eyes as if he had decided that no matter what happened next, he would not close them. When Smikle next took a swipe at him with the mitt, his eyes were open. He stepped back, avoided the blow with his eyes still on Smikle and landed his left jab. He was now less of a flincher.
The only way that he can become a non-flincher on the order of Donaldson — or Daine, who is a 2013 Western New England and New England Golden Glove champion — will be if he continues to practice what he learned Tuesday night.
“I tell them all the time,” Smikle said, “if you practice, you’ll train yourself. You come here to learn technique, skill — to get ideas.”
Discipline Trumps Talent
Chatter from the experienced boxers in the galley — including Canady (pictured), who was the AIBA (International Amateur Boxing Association) women’s heavyweight boxing world champion — singled out Donaldson as having all the qualities needed to be a good boxer. Except one: consistency.
Donaldson’s grandfather once owned the building that is now home to EIR. Donaldson, a Barnard Environmental Studies Magnet School student, has been training off and on since the gym opened. Canady said Donaldson has the build and athleticism to be a good boxer, but she doesn’t show up at the gym enough to maximize her potential. She’s been busy with basketball season.
No amount of athleticism or raw talent trumps discipline and consistency, Canady said. She tries to impart that lesson to all her boxers. She said she is happy to have Donaldson in the gym. “Having been a woman in the sport, it makes me smile to see more women and girls here,” she said.
Most of her boxers are boys and men, but she’s seeing more women and girls. The gym, which celebrated its third anniversary in January, serves ages 8 and up. It also takes boxing to local schools through a partnership with United Way that allows it to touch thousands of kids, Canady said.
Life Lessons
When you teach a kid to face something as scary for most kids as being punched in the face with their eyes open — to expect the hit — but to lessen the blow by skillfully minimizing its impact … you’re teaching them something more than boxing, Smikle said. You’re teaching them about life. You’re teaching them to face the hardships of life with less fear.
“We know that every kid here is not going to be a boxer,” he said. “But every kid can leave here healthier and more confident in who they are.”
He said people who don’t understand boxing just assume it involves two people beating each other up. “But boxing is not about violence,” he said. “It’s a sport. And it’s two people from anywhere in the world who have practiced their skills and are seeking to perform them.”
Boxing can take you places, far beyond the borders of New Haven. Smikle said. He should know. A former Jamaican amateur and professional boxer, he represented the island in the 1988 Olympics in Korea. He’s also Canady’s former trainer.
Kevin McCormick (pictured), for one, hopes the sport will take him far. The 21-year-old is this year’s Western New England Golden Glove heavyweight champion. He is one of two champions the gym produced at the Western New England Golden Gloves held in Holyoke, Mass. EIR also earned a trophy for best novice team, which Canady called an “incredible accomplishment for us as a new gym.” The gym has produced at least one Golden Glove Western New England champion every year since it opened, starting with Daine.
McCormick said he wants to influence the world through boxing, as Muhammad Ali and Joe Louis did. “People tend to listen to boxers,” he said. “They sort of seem to have respect for boxers, probably because they can knock you out.”
In the gym, the utmost respect goes to the trainer.
When Smikle told McCormick that he didn’t want him on the mats in his street clothes, he took a seat.
“You’re tired,” Smikle said. “Go get some rest.”
