Boxing event hits town

A local charity is set to gain from a corporate fight night in Hamilton this May.

The Corporate Gloves Fight Night is hitting Hamilton for its second corporate boxing event in conjunction with the Dream Chaser Foundation.

Organisers Ric Ellis and Simon Briggs of Corporate Gloves NZ hope to achieve two things on the night, a challenge for their corporate boxers and a successful auction to raise money for a local charity.

The Dream Chaser Foundation was established in 2012 in memory of Chace Topperwien by his family, who lost their son to acute myeloid leukemia (AML) after a 15-month battle.

The charity promotes bone marrow donations in New Zealand and helps support families working through difficult financial and emotional times.

Bone marrow transplants are a common form of treatment for children suffering from leukemia or other serious blood disorders; however, lack of donors reduces the chances of a donor match for children from the Maori or Pacific ethnic groups.

Chace’s father Ryan Topperwien, founder of the Dream Chaser foundation, chose the Corporate Gloves Fight Night as he believes the Corporate Gloves team shared the same enthusiasm for charity work.

“It was simply a meeting of like-minded people that wanted to put on a great event while raising some funds to continue towards our charitable goals,” Topperwein said.

Topperwien also hopes the event will help promote exposure for the Dream Chaser foundation.

“The more awareness and support we can generate the more families we will be able to assist,” he said.

“Chace taught us to never give up and so we are committed to transforming our heartache into a positive pathway forward and to help others who face difficult times.”

For the Corporate Gloves team the evening is about putting on a “high-level” black-tie event for boxers and the audience to enjoy.

Twenty corporate boxers are put through 12 weeks of intense training in preparation for the fight.

The Corporate Gloves team tactics include one-on-one training sessions which ensure each boxer is trained to strategies which best suit them.

Training includes box fit, pad work and one on one session to ensure fighters are well matched.

“When we match people we don’t match on paper, we match on ability,” Ringside Gym owner Ric Ellis said.

“Boxers want an event where they have a great experience and they don’t want to be mismatched, they want a challenge and we give them a challenge”.

“It’s a good opportunity to raise money to help people,” said Ellis, who has been a boxing coach for 24 years.

The Challenge 2014 Fight Night will be held on May 10^th at the Corporate Arena, Claudelands Event Centre.

The charity auction will include a meet and greet with the Warriors, signed chiefs jerseys, signed Silver Fern shirts and much more.