Charity boxing needs to be safer
Boxing authorities must move to more strictly regulate all charity boxing events in the wake of Kain Parsons’ tragic death after an injury at the Fight for Christchurch event.
Some – appalled at the second New Zealand-wide fatality in three years – will clamour for charity boxing to be banned.
British brain injury charity Headway this year called for boxing, in general, to be outlawed after the third death of a British fighter in five years.
But banning charity boxing would only drive the practice underground, leading to unsanctioned events without licensed trainers, qualified referees and medical support.
Do we really want a return to the days when people flocked to bare knuckle brawls with a lookout on the door?
Kain Parsons’ passing should, however, lead to a comprehensive review of Fight for Christchurch’s practices and the general rules applying to charity boxing.
It is time for the organisations that sanction charity boxing events – New Zealand National Boxing Federation (NZNBF) and New Zealand Professional Boxing Association (NZPBA) – which licenses charity events – to heed the warnings of experienced boxing trainers and make stringent safety practices mandatory at every event, big or small.
This tragedy is the most serious of several troubling incidents at New Zealand charity boxing events this year.
A man was knocked out for 20 minutes and hospitalised for four days with a brain injury at a Boxing Alley event in Auckland in April. That led Boxing Alley to cancel corporate fights indefinitely.
Auckland’s Peach Gym also quit the corporate fight scene after 36-year-old Joel Rea was severely concussed at a corporate fight in September.
Rea’s wife, Olivia, told NZME she was furious that he was allowed to fight after just five weeks training and said his opponent was up to 40kg
heavier. The NZME report claimed Joel Rea had not disclosed a childhood brain injury to event promoters.
This year’s incidents follow the 2016 death of 49-year-old Hamilton man Neville Knight, who collapsed in the ring and died in his fiancee’s arms at a charity event.
His death prompted Amateur International Boxing Association (AIBA) New Zealand spokesman Keith Walker to say charity boxing should be banned.
Other insiders felt it needed to be regulated and predicted Knight’s death would be a ‘‘gamechanger’’ leading to more stringently policed rules.
But has it? Experienced Auckland trainer Harry Otty told NZME this year: ‘‘You could go to a corporate event anywhere in the country and one boxer will have shorts, singlet and a head guard on, the other boxer will have no singlet, no head guard.’’
Kain Parsons was not wearing headgear, which was optional.
Former Olympic Games trainer Phil Shatford, who has run scores of charity boxing events, said the rules varied from event to event, and ‘‘that is totally wrong’’.
It’s time the regulators listened to the experts such as Shatford and fellow Christchurch trainer Brian Barry, who had fighters in this weekend’s event.
Saddened at Parsons’ plight, they called on boxing authorities to insist on a raft of safety measures for all corporate events.
They want mandatory headgear, increased glove sizes and contestants to be trained by licensed trainers. They also want a greater emphasis on matchmaking to ensure fighters aren’t asked to punch above their weight.
Boxing principles must take priority over entertainment.