BOXING, BUT NOT SMART
If you have to take up an exercise regimen, don’t take it up with a boxing champ, writes Stephen Haw
Ican already hear his voice in my head and I’m not even fully awake yet. “Steve, I’m watching you Steve … Don’t give up on yourself … Steve. I’m watching you.” The voice belongs to Isaac Chilemba. He’s my trainer and a light-heavyweight world boxing champion, so I try to listen to him as best I can. Today is not a good day. My WhatsApp face-time session should have started already but I can’t seem to find oneof my shoes and I’ve got to clean the gym mat because the dog’s been pissing on it in retaliation for not being walked. And then there’s the insistent ring of my phone with Isaac’s face on it.
It’s so much better in the gym. Sure, I have to deal with the frightening prospect of Isaac coming for me in the flesh, but I can wear protective gear and, although I haven’t managed to tame him, I’ve learnt a few tricks when it comes to running down the clock. At around the two-minute mark, I often feint a couple of technical questions on the finer points of throwing a particular kind of jab.
“So Isaac, tell me, if I throw the jab from below the eye line, and hold my glove like this, down at my side, does that work? I mean, it’ll be effective, but it’s not going to be very hard, is it?”
“No, Steve.”
As I say, I haven’t managed to tame him completely, but sometimes I do manage to slow him down for just long enough to snatch a few gasps of oxygen.
“The clock’s running, Steve.”
And if that doesn’t work, I try to make him laugh. Which is a lot easier than you might think, partly because I’m so useless.
He once told me (after a session) that, “There are three kinds of clients: those who are naturally talented; those who, if they work very hard, for a long time, can be trained to look a bit like boxers; and the untrainables. You, Steve, are in the second category.”
I knew then that he was not without kindness, though I suspect he’d only said that because he knew the truth would break me even more than he already had.
Now, my only defence seems to be a bad WiFi connection, though it’s not quite as bad as I make out.
“Sorry Isaac, you’re breaking up … Did you say ‘Take a break?’”
“No, Steve. I said ‘burpees’, three sets of 25.”
Maybe, it’s just the buffering but humour doesn’t work like it used to. And if you want proof, look no further that the burpee itself. I mean, what maniacal entity even dreamed up such a cruelty?
Could the same god who invented beer have invented burpees? It’s amazing where the mind goes between burpee 19 and burpee 24. Sometimes I find myself thinking about sex, but that just seems kind of wrong — especially with the pissed-off dog on the sidelines giving me the side-eye.
Wait a moment … I’ve just lost reception. Oh no. He’s back. “Steve. I can see you. Don’t give up on yourself Steve.”
I try the oldest trick in the book. “I need water.”
“No, Steve. Remember, good boxers don’t need water; bad boxers don’t deserve it.”
Next I try the old-age counter. “Isaac, you forget how old I am. At my age, you should be offering me some kind of pensioner’s discount. Yes?” That should put him on the back foot.
“No, Steve. Age is just a number.”
Lastly, I appeal to his sense of common humanity. “Isaac … surely as a trainer, you need to be able to assess your client. You need to be able to see whether he’s on death’s door or not? It’s not a good look, you know … body bags?”
And then the sucker punch: “Dead clients don’t pay.”
“I can see you Steve. Don’t give up on yourself. Push Steve, I can see you.”
And that is really the problem. He can, more clearly than ever. Out here on the patio, there are no distractions. All the stuff I couldn’t get away with in the gym, I still can’t. And all the stuff I could, I now can’t. There is, simply, no place to hide.
“I see you, Steve.”