Razor-sharp Roarke fine-tunes his blows
Barber turned fighter is working towards a dream of ring success
● Roarke Knapp may be deadly with a cutthroat razor in his hand, but as a boxer he’s still learning how to inflict maximum damage without taking too many shots himself.
The 20-year-old former barber takes another step towards his dream of becoming a top-drawer pugilist when he fights on the undercard of Kevin Lerena’s return to the ring at Emperors Palace on Saturday night.
Lerena tests his right shoulder for the first time since undergoing surgery in July last year in the third defence of his IBO cruiserweight title against unbeaten Germanybased Artur Mann.
Knapp, with a record of six wins and one draw, takes on Thembani Mhlanga over eight rounds at junior-middleweight in his first fight under new trainer Vusi Mtolo, also Colin Nathan’s assistant at the Hot Box stable.
He sparred several rounds this week with super-middleweights Alfonso Tissen and stablemate Ryno Liebenberg.
There were many lessons and they were mostly painful, especially when Liebenberg buried a well-timed hook into Knapp’s body.
“Aaahh,” Knapp complained, but to his credit he stayed on his feet.
Mtolo shouted instructions frequently, and afterwards his sparring partners offered advice. “Your biggest mistake, Roarke,” Liebenberg told him, “is not holding your concentration after an exchange.”
But there was praise too. “Your overhand is deadly,” added Liebenberg.
Knapp is a quick learner — in the ring and the barber shop. Many interns practise shaving with a cut-throat razor on balloons, but Knapp was told to do his first one on a live specimen, his first boss.
“I was shaking like a leaf, I had a sweat patch on my shirt I was so nervous, but I managed to do it without cutting him.
“My boss said ‘don’t waste your time on a balloon, just try it on me, it’s no problem’. I managed not to cut him. I was chucked in the deep end with barbering and boxing.”
Knapp was around nine when he took up the sport after his stepdad spotted him getting bullied by other schoolkids.
“I used to get bullied heavily when I was small. I was a very scrawny kid, big front teeth, freckles all over my face, I was a soft kid and I used to get picked on.”
He was enrolled at the famous Booysens club in Johannesburg’s south, but it took a while to get used to this new sport.
“My first lesson was a bit of a wake-up call, I got punched in the mouth and I cried because I’d never been punched in the mouth before. But after getting used to it, I enjoyed it and I showed a natural ability.”
His confidence grew to the point that he was prepared to hit back.
“I went to the [school] tuck shop to get a R2 juice, and he [another kid] wanted to take it from me and I said ‘don’t take it because I’m going to punch you’, and as he reached for it I punched him in the mouth.
“And that was it — his lip was bleeding a bit and he started crying.”
Knapp, who played for the Pinnacle football academy in Britain where he lived with his mom as a teenager for a few years before he returned to SA, had dreamed of boxing at the Olympics. But after getting just four amateur fights despite attending more than 25 tournaments, he turned professional in 2016.
He linked up with Mtolo last year.
“As much as it hurts, bru, I enjoy sparring with you and Fonz,” Knapp told Liebenberg. “You know, it gives me the experience and it toughens me up. I’ve got national-level sparring for the first time in my career.”
The bill will be live on SS8 from 7pm.