In this corner ...
New Glasgow woman, 41, getting ready for in-ring debut
A couple of years ago, Shauna Fukes saw a newspaper article about a women’s fitness class at the Albion Amateur Boxing Club and decided to check it out.
“I walked in there as a 39-yearold and I knew nobody,” says the mother of two boys.
At first, she thought it might be a good way to get in shape, but as time passed, she began to enjoy the friendships in the fitness class, the sense of togetherness.
There was something else: she started to like boxing — really like it — and after a while, the coaches saw something in her.
“Coach Al (Archibald) came up to me one day and asked me in passing if I’d ever be interested in competitive boxing and I said ‘I might be.’”
Fukes, whose sons are seven and 11 years old, had played ringette for a couple of years in her early teens, but had never competed in any other sport.
“I don’t know why boxing became my thing,” she says. “There’s just something about it.”
A number cruncher with the Department of Community Services, Fukes is analytical by nature, which can only help in the ring.
“I liken boxing to chess with your hands — it’s a strategic thing.”
Her dad, John Slaney, had taken note of her new passion.
“He’d say ‘I think it’s great that you’re doing this – when things are bothering you, it’s an outlet.’”
John Slaney died a few weeks ago, on Aug. 27. In the days that followed, his daughter would learn he’d been talking with his buddies about her boxing.
“At his funeral,” she says, “some of his friends came up to me and said ‘we’ve been hearing about your boxing.’ My dad was proud of me.”
Not long after, a new boxing season was underway, but with the death of her father still fresh in her mind, Fukes wasn’t sure if she wanted to work toward a competitive match.
After a while, “Jim (Worthen) told me I had to decide if my heart was in it or not.”
Apparently, it was: Fukes is not only doing the women’s fitness class these days, (‘get fit without getting hit’ is the program’s motto) she’s staying after class, working out with the competitive boxers, getting prepped for Nov. 18 and a boxing card in New Glasgow.
Nothing good is easy
It’s not easy, this boxing thing. The many hours of training – and the fear – have driven more than one budding pugilist away from the ring.
While her husband Craig is at home looking after the boys three nights a week, Fukes spends hours pounding at a heavy bag, her hair drenched with sweat. Or she’s skipping, or running, or trading punches in a sparring session with a former national female champion.
“Shauna loves that it’s hard,” says Erin MacGregor.
Formerly Erin Simpson and a two-time Canadian boxing champion, MacGregor is a certified boxing instructor who is working with Fukes at the Trenton boxing ring, along with coaches Worthen, Archibald and Walter Linthorne.
“She wants it so bad and she’s got a lot of drive to achieve the goal,” MacGregor says of her student.
Fukes says her teacher “doesn’t care about my age and treats me no differently than the other kids. Age is just a number – it really is.”
It’s one thing to be calm when your first-ever competitive match is weeks away, but when the day arrives and it’s time to answer the bell, it might be a different story.
“It’s definitely not the same,” MacGregor says. “There are nerves, and everybody is different. You really don’t know what you’re going to feel like until you do it.”
The Nov. 18 card will be Fuke’s first competitive match and while she wouldn’t be the first boxer to get the jitters stepping into that environment, she’s not sensing the nerves – at least not now.
“I wanted this. Why would I be nervous?”