Guyana’s Pan American Games bronze medalist Clive Atwell and Hendrick Pelswijk, who represented Guyana at the World Championships in Chicago USA which ended last month, were among the winners when the Guyana Amateur Boxing Association (GABA) held its Champion of Champions bouts Friday and Saturday night at the National Gymnasium.
Atwell, representing the Ricola Boxing Gym, defeated Clevon Rock of the Guyana Defence Force (GDF) on points in their bantamweight clash while Pelswijk, also of Ricola, defeated Sheldon Phillips of the Pocket Rocket Boxing Gym (PRBG) on points in a light welterweight bout.
Middleweight boxer Markember Pierre, who also represented Guyana at the World Championships, was unable to land an opponent while pan American Games representative Ryan Jeffers was unable to contest the final of the featherweight category against team mate Ray Sandiford of the GDF, for medical reasons.
There were 28 bouts over the two nights as the GABA pitted the champions and runners-up from three tournaments into the main draw of the competition. The three tournaments are the Inter-mediate held in March; the National Open championships held in July/August and the B. L Crombie Memorial held in November.
The event was sponsored to the tune of $160,000 by the Guyana telephone and Telegraph Ltd which paid all the expenses for the tournament, president of the GABA Affeeze Khan told Stabroek Sport.
“We selected the champions and runners-up from each of the three championships and then they went into a draw and according to the draw that was how they ended up fighting,” co-ordinator of the event Carl Franklyn said.
Khan said the tournament, which attracted boxers from Berbice and Essequibo, was well attended by spectators which included family and friends of boxers and said that the GABA’s next venture was to select a team to go into specialized training for the Beijing Olympic Games box-off in Trinidad in March-April, next year.
Khan also disclosed that the GABA was arranging a referee/judging course in early January.
Contact persons for this course include Franklyn (telephone number 618-9830) Rudolph Torrington (231-4652) secretary of Referee/Judges Commission Ramona Agard (622-4043) and chairman of the Referee/Judges Commission, Keith French (618-2285).
Some of the boxers who participated over the two nights were from the GABA’s Just Starters programme.
Khan said the Just Starters U-15 programme is his initiative, the aim of which is to expose young boxers who recently started in the sport.
“That’s our focus for next year,” he said
