After a few years of competition hiatus, amateur boxing is ready to go a few more rounds in Vernon.
A total of 28 boxers from 10 clubs across the province will compete in a Boxing B.C.-sanctioned card Saturday night at the Vernon Rec Centre auditorium.
In the headliner, Salmon Arm’s Derrick Larson, who trains out of the CounterPunch Boxing Club in Vernon, will be in tough against 2010 PamAm silver medalist Jag Seehra of the Inner City Boxing Club in Prince George in their 64-kg bout.
“We haven’t had a bout in Vernon for years now. We want to bring it back and make it a regular event,” said Tony Stamboulieh, CounterPunch head instructor and vice president of Boxing B.C.
“We want to promote good amateur boxing and showcase a lot of good, young fighters in the sport.”
In exhibition action, four-time national amateur champion Kenny Lally will go up against Nikko Ippollto of the Kamloops Boxing Academy.
Lally, 21, who fights out of Inner City, was recently named one of five boxers who will represent Canada at the world championships later this year in Azerbaijian. The event is the first of two qualifiers for the 2012 Olympics in London.
In the lone female bout, CounterPunch’s Sarah Petznick will go up against Stacy Lee of Victoria’s Capital City Boxing Club in the 75-kg division.
Other local club boxers include CounterPunch’s Santiago Abrega, Tyson Veitch, Matt Peet and Kyle Ayotte, and the Vernon Boxing Club’s Jake Stuchberry, Dustin Gawne and Brett Ouch. They will tangle with fighters from clubs in Vancouver, Victoria, Peachland, Revelstoke, Salmon Arm, Kelowna, Kamloops, Prince George and Pemberton.
Tickets are $10 and can be purchased in advance at Breakaway Fitness. Doors open at 6 p.m., and the action starts at 7 p.m.
The Cancer Society will operate a concession.
“We want anybody who is interested to be able to come,” said Stamboulieh.
CounterPunch Boxing trains Mondays and Tuesdays out of Breakaway Fitness. Stamboulieh says the training is for all levels, ambitions and age groups.
“We have people who just come to work out. They don’t necessarily have to compete.”
