Young Farmers Fight Night raises thousands for Westpac Air Ambulance
Young male and female farmers climbed into the boxing ring last weekend to raise thousands of dollars for charity.
Young farmers going toe-to-toe in the boxing ring for charity has proven such a success the event is likely to be repeated next year. The Young Farmers Fight Night may become an annual event following the success of Fight Night 2012 at the Don Rowlands Centre in Karapiro.
A sell-out crowd of 240 fans attended the Westpac Air Ambulance boxing match fundraiser between North Island young farmers.
Te Kawa West Young Farmers president and competitor Courtney Goodare said the club has been bombarded with positive e-mails and feedback about the night and they will be looking to make The Fight Night an annual event.
“After the huge success, turnout and plenty of positive feedback we think it would be foolish not to do this again. The night raised $5000 towards the air ambulance. The aim will be to make the event bigger and better and preferably run alongside the national Fieldays for 2013.”
Organizer and competitor Tony Peake said the biggest highlight was seeing the night come together after months of organizing.
“The night was absolutely fantastic. It ran very well and exceeded all our expectations. For the night to have worked we needed everyone to show up, judges, ambulance, doctors, boxers, coaches, refs and everyone did – the night just came together perfectly. We really could not have asked for a better night.”
Both Tony and Courtney were champions on the night, with Tony winning on majority points 30/27, 29/29, 29/28, and Courtney winning by unanimous points 30/27, 29/28, 30/27. Courtney said even after a lot of training it was still good to have his coach Rodd Jefferies nearby in the ring.
“The first round didn’t go so well for me but a few pep-talks in between rounds with my coach helped me to focus and remember the basics. A couple of people predicted that I would come out worse off so to come out with a win was good to prove critics wrong.” Tony said the event might now be over for the year but his boxing in the near future is not.
“Before this event came around I never saw myself taking up boxing as a sport but now that I know what it’s about I learnt that it’s not a blood sport at all, more so a real technical thinker’s game and I will definitely keep training and hopefully competing.”
The Young Farmers thanked the New Zealand Professional Boxing Association, the Don Rowland Centre and sponsors who made the night possible: Barrowcliffe Shearing; Rearing to go calf rearing; Murphy’s law-Irish bar; Ecolab, Farm Right; The Lawerson Group; KPMG; The Rock FM; The Waikato Times; Jagermeister; and Straight 70 Furrow.
