Boissevain boxer on the rise in amateur ranks

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This article was published 08/09/2011 (5424 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

She isn’t quite an overnight success, but only eight months into her young amateur boxing career, Boissevain’s Natasha Armstrong is quickly becoming one of the top young contenders in the country.

The 14-year-old member of the Brandon Boxing Club already sports a 5-1 amateur record after winning her first five fights, capturing the provincial Golden Gloves featherweight title and advancing all the way to the final of the 110-pound division in the Ringside World Amateur Boxing Championships in Kansas City, Mo., last month.

It’s an impressive start for a girl who only began the sport for the workout benefits back in December.

“When I went there (to the Brandon Boxing Club), I wasn’t expecting to fight or anything,” Armstrong said. “I was just going to try it out and see if I liked it and after my first fight I just fell in love with boxing …

“I just love the workout and the adrenalin rush before a fight and during it. And just the feeling of winning.”

Armstrong’s Golden Gloves title came in her amateur boxing debut in Winnipeg in May, winning back-to-back bouts capped with a triumph over Eastman’s Taylor Spooner — who was 4-1 entering the fight — in a unanimous decision to take the provincial title in the 110-pound women’s division. Armstrong went on to win three straight and advance to the title bout at the Ringside World Amateur Championships before dropping a tough decision to Brenda Roman of Brooklyn, N.Y.

“There were a lot of people there and good boxers, (but) after about the first round, I felt more comfortable and I was doing well,” Armstrong said.

“It was a really good experience and I learned a lot of stuff while I was down there. It was a lot tougher fights, but it was just a really good experience for me.”

Armstrong’s success hasn’t come by accident. Despite facing a one-hour commute each way, Armstrong regularly makes the trip to the Wheat City five or six times a week to train with Brandon Boxing Club owner and pro fighter Noel Harding.

“She’s off to an amazing start and it has to do with her extreme dedication to the sport,” Harding said. “Living an hour out of town doesn’t make it easy for any athlete to compete … She needs sparring, she needs work with coaches in the gym and her family has gone to great lengths to bring her in on a regular basis so that she can compete at this level.

“She is very competitive and she is the first (local) boxer, male or female, to go 5-0 right off the bat, so that’s very impressive. For a girl that just turned 14, she is a very tough girl and that’s what it takes. She is very strong-willed, dedicated and resilient for sure.”

While boxing isn’t exactly the first choice for teenage girls when it comes to sports, the Grade 9 student at Boissevain Collegiate has found her friends supportive, but not exactly willing to climb into the ring.

“My friends, they think it’s cool, a different sport, but they (don’t want) to box,” she said.

In the meantime, Armstrong has set her sights on winning a national title one day and taking another shot at the world amateur championship title.

“I would maybe like to go to nationals and be a Canadian champ and I would like to go back to Ringside next year and try to win it,” she said.

Harding believes she certainly has what it takes to do just that.

“I think with Natasha over the next couple of years, I envision her making the Canadian junior team for sure … and I think she can have a career in this sport for sure at the rate she is excelling already,” Harding said.

PARTING SHOTS: Harding, who is 1-0 as a pro, is planning to box in a pro demonstration bout in the Brandon club’s Addison-Fowler-Cantelo Memorial amateur boxing card slated for Saturday, Oct. 8 in the Keystone Centre’s UCT Pavillion. Harding’s next official pro bout is expected to come at King John Boxing’s Halloween Havoc 3 in Winnipeg at the end of October.