Self Taught Journey

By Dylan Nguyen

Ever since I was five years old, I have always wanted to do boxing. I never understood the rules nor even knew it was a sport. It just looked awesome to have the respect of the world by just becoming a champion. I looked up to the likes of Manny Pacquiao since he was my dad’s favorite boxer at the time. I used to remember how he would dominate in the ring. I used to think he was the strongest because he didn’t fight for the money, he fought for the glory and pride of a boxer. I really wanted to be like him growing up because I thought he was the strongest. But soon my family would tell me to give it up because they told me I would get hurt. 

I would never think about boxing again until nine years later. In my freshman year, I found a group of my friends boxing each other. Just using 2 pairs of boxing gloves. I remember them encouraging me to put on the gloves and box. I didn’t know how to throw a punch or how to protect myself, yet I did it anyway. I put them on and went against someone who was lighter than me but much faster and knew how to dodge a punch. I remember for about 2 minutes I was just getting hit over and over again and I couldn't land a single punch no matter how hard or how fast I threw it. He kept hitting me in the face and in the body.

But something happened in that fight, something I realized in that sparring match. His punches didn’t hurt me. I didn’t feel pain nor a sting. At that moment I decided to just keep throwing punches until I landed one, not caring if he hit me or not. That’s when for the first time I landed a clean punch to the right side of his face and stopped the match with one punch. He got a black eye sadly and I felt bad afterwards but the feeling of a clean hit never left my body. Sadly soon after, Osuna caught us and kicked us off campus.

But one and a half years later, I got the chance to own my first pair of boxing gloves. In the summer my sister ordered me boxing gloves, hand wraps, and a mouth guard. Soon after getting these things I called my friend over to spar with me. He is an experienced boxer who has trained before, so in this match I tried to see what I can learn just from sparring. But the only things I learned in the spar was that I lacked basic punches and common footwork in boxing. My friend would dodge all my punches and back me in a corner. He would tire me out, due to me missing a lot of punches and having to hold my guard just to take a break. 

Although I lost, I learned many things I need to work on. For the next 2 weeks I chose to train heavily in boxing, working on my footwork and my guard. The next time we spared, I’d have improved a lot and become stronger and faster than before. For the second time we would spar once more. I knew what to do, step in to apply pressure with a barrage of punches and step back out to avoid being hit. Although he was able to dodge a lot of punches I eventually was able to tire him out with the constant punches and dodge of his punches. To the point where on his last stand, he had his guard up and I would step in to throw a straight, hook, and uppercut. Step back out to dodge his uppercut and land a 1-2 overhand right to his temple. Rocking his brain, causing him to forfeit. Making me win the bout against him.

This journey allowed me to grow mentally and physically. I used to think I was weak and couldn’t do anything to protect anyone I care about. But seeing how, that if I train. I can protect anyone no matter what happens. It’s helped see myself as a stronger person and has taught me a lot of tricks. Like how to dodge a punch and how to block incoming attacks while also teaching me footwork as well. I’m thankful for my sister and friends because, for the longest time I’ve been wanting to learn how to protect myself and others whenever I can and this has helped me achieve the dream to protect the ones I love while gaining a new dream. I wish to join a boxing gym and become an amateur boxer and try to become a pro boxer and become the super middleweight champion of the world. 

For Warrior Times,

This is Dylan Nguyen