Glory Boxing Gym

By Robert Ramos

"Heart & Soul"

During the last few days remaining in 2010, as I vacationed with my family in Tucson Arizona to celebrate Christmas and New Year, I felt this strange urge pulling at me to visit the Glory Boxing gym in Phoenix, which was an hour and a half away. Being from Chicago, I asked a few family members to accompany me on this long and unfamiliar journey, but everyone turned me down, due to the pre-new year tamale and food preparations that needed to get done. Disappointedly, I searched for the motivation to go it alone. All of a sudden, just like clockwork, a posting from Glory Boxing Gym’s Facebook wall magically appeared. It read, “Jose Benavidez Jr. will be sparring at 5:00pm today, please stop by to watch the open public workout.” That was it, my mind was made up! I was going to visit this newly opened gym by Jose Benavidez Sr. The decision to open the gym was set after a year long training camp at Freddie Roach's Wild Card gym in Los Angeles, with his son, the up and coming boxer, future world champion, Jose Benavidez Jr.

I originally met the little known Jose Benavidez Jr. back in Chicago on May 29, 2010, after he fought his 6th pro fight at the UIC Pavilion and won by a devastating 1st round knockout. Jose Jr. was approachable and did not hesitate to pose for pictures with my son Alec and I. It was that personal experience and the fantastic display of ringmanship that Jose Jr. displayed while sparring with current world champion Manny Pacquiao on a YouTube video that made me want to learn more about him.

Jose’s father, Jose Benavidez Sr. explained, during their time in L.A. at Wild Card, both father and son gained much needed and valuable experience under the watchful and skilled eye of master trainer Freddie Roach. During their yearlong stay, they had the opportunity to spar with Manny Pacquiao, Amir Khan and many other great world ranked fighters. What led to the Benavidez’s return to Phoenix was that Freddie was being bombarded by other top ranked pro boxers who also craved for Freddie’s training, this in turn gave Freddie very limited time to work with the young Jose Jr. Father and son team Benavidez decided to back to the comfort of their hometown of Phoenix to refocus and utilize some of the knowledge they gained and hope to work with Freddie again in the near future.

With the opening of the Glory Boxing gym right smack in the middle of their "barrio viejo" (old neighborhood) Jose Sr. wants to give back to their community by offering hope via way of boxing to many underprivileged youth who reside there. Jose Sr. stated "We recently had a blanket drive and a toy drive here at the gym, so that the gym could help out those less fortunate and become a focal point of the community where everyone can feel welcome.” This is the feeling I got immediately after stepping foot in the gym. Jose Sr. also spoke to me about the misfortune of growing up without parents and how the cold hard streets of L.A. forced him to learn boxing simply for the means of self-defense and confessed that his boxing ring skills left little to be desired.

I mentioned to Jose Sr. that I was impressed at how well he had brought up his son, not only in regards to his boxing skills, but also to his mild mannered and well spoken demeanor. Jose Sr. thanked me, but modestly side stepped my compliment of his great ability to train and keep his son focused to compete at such an elite level. Jose Sr. said, “It is more important that my son Jose Jr. become a good person with integrity and fully understand the value of giving back to his community.” This “Pay it forward” attitude must stem from Jose Sr.’s personal experiences while growing up. Father and son bonded because of their mutual love for the sport of boxing, especially when Jose Jr. tried out many other sports like baseball and soccer, but it was boxing that won Jr. over.

I was also able to secure a one on one video interview with Jose Jr. We spoke of his past, present and future. The complete Jose Benavidez Jr. interview will be my upcoming story piece.

I met many other Glory boxing gym family members during my short visit, I was able to freely converse with parents of a few of the young boxer's, one of who's name is Alfredo Escarcega who spoke with me about and his son Alfredo Escarcega Jr. who has won numerous national boxing championships, being personally invited by the Benavidez family to join the Glory team and how excited he was to be a part of the gym.

I met another father, Dorian Khan Sr. who was also born in raised in Chicago just like I was. Dorian grew up on the Chicago’s south side and we spoke about the challenges that we both faced growing up on Chicago's mean streets. There were many similarities in our experiences even though we both lived on opposite sides of the city. We are both saddened on how youth are still killing each other at an alarming rate due to lack of productive after school programs. Dorian also spoke proudly of how his son 8 year old Dorian Khan Jr. who is the youngest and most inexperienced of all the Glory Boxing gym members, is now training with some of the best boxers in the nation. Dorian Sr. was pleasantly surprised at how the Mexican never back down tough style of fighting that is common at Glory is now rubbing off on his son, who normally chooses to box, stick and move his way out of sticky situations while competing. Now, Dorian Jr. has no problems going "mano a mano" (toe to toe) with tough puncher brawlers.

I also met Jaime Bojado, whom I was surprised to find out is the younger cousin of the once famous upcoming star boxer, Francisco Bojado from L.A. Jaime is also originally from L.A., but now resides in Buckeye Arizona, a suburb of Phoenix. Jaime is definitely not lacking any boxing skill, or fame in his own right. Jaime is currently ranked #2 in the nation within the USA Boxing Jr. Men’s 132 pound open division and has over 149 bouts with only 9 losses on his amateur record. Jaime’s goal is to gain a spot on the U.S. Olympic boxing team and one day world champion, however, unlike many young boxers who aspire to become a champion, Jaime’s record and experience clearly shows he’s the “real deal.” I see a great future for this charismatic young man and hope to secure a more detailed interview with him soon.

I also had the pleasure of meeting the newly crowned Queen of Glory, gym manager Emily Pandelakis, who at first eyed me with caution and curiosity, but then easily warmed up when I told her I was writing for Cuerus, a Chicago bilingual boxing newspaper and was interested in writing about Jose Benavidez Jr. At one point during our friendly and effortless back and forth banter, Emily jokingly stated that she would have me thrown out of the gym immediately if I didn’t behave. I’m sure as nice of a person that she is, she would definitely have no problem doing so.

Even though I longed to reunite with my family back in Tucson, I felt a bit reluctant and sad to leave the gym, especially knowing that I had a 151 mile ride back, however, the lengthy yet peaceful drive gave me time to reflect on my visit. I now knew the reason that I felt pulled so strongly to go visit the small Glory Boxing gym, past the long stretch of desert in the middle of the “barrio Viejo,” the place was filled with God’s spirit and overflowing with “Heart and Soul.”