By Rob Quintiliani
Usually the things that you least want to do end up giving you the most. When I was presented with the option to go through six weeks of intense boxing training, at 6am every weekday, at Third Street Gym, and to fight someone from the SF Weekly at the end it was an easy decision…Hell No!
But then I looked a little deeper, beyond the gimmick that was fighting the Weekly. I saw guaranteed weight loss, changing my eating (and getting drunk) habits, seeing the sun come up every morning, strutting like a pimp every day because of sore legs, beating my brother in a bare knuckle push-up competition, and on and on…So I changed my tune and figured, what the hell… and six weeks and 1 win by TKO later, it’s hard to believe that I almost turned down the opportunity to throw down.
I learned quickly that signing on for bootcamp and finishing bootcamp are two very different propositions. The group of over 50 shrank to about 30 by the end as injuries and exhaustion led people to stop showing up…Of course my opponent from the SF Weekly was also one of the 20 to go, despite being the one to pursue the contest in the first place.