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| Home » News » Sheffield Hosts Olympic Hopeful Boxing Camp and Competition
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| Sheffield Hosts Olympic Hopeful Boxing Camp and Competition |
OLYMPIC boxing hopefuls from across the globe will converge on Sheffield's English Institute of Sport (EISS) for a five team training camp and competition this month.
The prestigious Sheffield International Venues-managed facility will host teams from Sweden, France, Great Britainand the giant boxing nations of Kazakhstanand Indiain a week long event.
Around 50 boxers will use the first five days (14-18 Jan) as a training camp before moving into a two day tournament representing their individual countries.
The public can watch the bouts on Saturday and Sunday (19/20 Jan) to be hopefully attended by the new Amateur Boxing Association of England’s president Richard Caborn.
Each team, including the GB boxers who are based at EISS throughout the year, will use the camp to prepare for the forthcoming Beijing Olympics this August. The camp will be used to showcase the facility as an ideal venue for high profile boxing teams looking to plan ahead and book a training base ahead of London 2012.
GB coach Terry Edwards said: "You honestly cannot get better than this venue for training and competition preparation. When these top foreign teams arrive and see where we are hosting this camp and competition they will be stunned.
"The fact they can access all these sports facilities under one roof plus the support services is an unknown concept to them. The GB squad is exceptionally lucky to have this on tap."
The Sheffield-trained GB boxers, who automatically qualified for Beijingafter returning victorious from the world championships in 2007,now train at EISS following the ABAE's decision to relocate the GB squad to the SIV-managed venue last year.
Frankie Gavin, who became the first British boxer in history to win a gold medal at the world championships, will join fellow qualifiers Brad Saunders, Joe Murray and Tony Jeffries, at the camp at EISS.
Lorenzo Clark, director of operations at Sheffield International Venues (SIV) which manages the venue, said the event was another step in the SIV's and the city’s plan to generate and support potential future medal winners for 2012.
"The international squads are coming into EISS because of the excellent facilities we offer. It's an exceptional venue and other countries are talking to us to use the facilities in the build up to Beijingand beyond to 2012."
Cllr Tim Rippon, Cabinet Member for Economic Regeneration, Culture and Planning, at Sheffield City Council, said: “The city is now playing a major role in creating a world class development and training environment for amateur boxers and is already home to the Amateur Boxing Association of England. Hosting training camps helps raise the profile of the city internationally and will help with our bid to host teams in the run up to the Olympics. The City is determined to ensure its facilities and experience in events organisation are fully utilised in the build up to 2012.”
Sportspulse, the company tasked with developing the sports business sector of South Yorkshire, has assisted in the training camp as part of its work for the South Yorkshire 2012 Steering Group, by arranging domestic transport for international teams and providing a financial support for an event reception. |
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