Old School" is in, baby. It's what the cool people are doing.
For some reason, probably known only to Freudian theorists and
bartenders, our society likes to hearken back in time when old-fashioned
values like toughness and character freely roamed the earth. Whether
it's modern cars designed to resemble vintage automobiles, television
channels showing "classic sports," or throwback jerseys worn by
teams of yesteryear, we have a compelling, nostalgic urge to connect
to our predecessors. Extending this idea to the world of athletic
competition, nothing says"retro like a good whack to the head.
College Club boxing is about as Old School as you can get.
February and March will bring forth this year's version of the
Bengal Bouts, the annual campus boxing tournament that raises
funds for Holy Cross missions ministering to the impoverished
regions of Bangladesh. Domers and others who follow the Bouts
are well versed in its history and traditions that date back to
the early part of the 20th century. Collegiate club boxing is
something that exists almost as an anachronism at a relatively
small number of universities and colleges in the United States,
surviving almost like a well-worn, unsightly, but comfortable
sweatshirt. While some may be drawn to the outward spectacle of
two fighters going halfsies on a donnybrook, the real staying
power of college boxing lies in its ability to galvanize and exhort
its participants into physical performance they never thought
possible. Boxing's durableness is also derived from the spectators
who watch and are moved by what they witness. A favorable by-product
of the whole process is that these collegiate boxers become better
people as a result. A catchword for this process is "character
development," a mantra many universities include in their mission
statements.
Boxing is by all accounts a rough sport, and for some the character
development sometimes unfortunately arrives via uppercut. This
is perhaps why some institutions of higher learning would seemingly
favor more modern, esoteric, and less sweaty methods of instruction.
The character forming aspects of boxing are nonetheless impossible
to replicate in a lecture, interactive software, or any amount
of convoluted diagrams adorned with multicolored dots, exploding
arrows, and incomprehensible but impressive-sounding verbiage.
College boxing is like one of those home remedies that your old-country
grandmother forced on you when you were a sick kid, made with
horrible tasting stuff no longer available at fancy chain supermarkets,
but that nonetheless rarely failed to rout the offending germs
out like an avenging angel trying to meet a deadline. Among the
universities besides Notre Dame that still perceive the character
building aspects of boxing are the military service academies.
These schools also place a premium on personal development and
service. As a person who boxed at both the U.S. Air Force Academy
as a cadet and at Notre Dame as a graduate student, boxing served
as the single most intensive, compelling and shaping experience
at both schools.
So who are these collegiate boxers and what compels intelligent
young men and women into the ring, people who spend their mornings
developing their minds and their afternoons absorbing leather
with their heads? Most are kids who have had active high school
athletic careers. Although they are perhaps not physically gifted
to continue playing their sports at the big-money collegiate level,
these athletes still simmer with the desire to compete. Very few
college students are gifted enough to play varsity athletics,
nonetheless for kids who have spent their entire lives playing
organized sports, having an athletic career end is like an early
death. Collegiate club sports such as boxing offer a second lease
on life.
When a person takes a step forward and decides to voluntarily
participate in a publicly sanctioned spectacle such as the Bengal
Bouts or its equivalent tournament at the Air Force Academy, the
Cadet Wing Open, it may engender a rugged type of respect from
other people. The downside is that the aspiring hero is still
expected to demonstrate a certain degree of skill. Should the
person publicly reveal himself to be inept he will be thought
of as a fool, maybe an idiot, or at best a cautionary tale. If
he succeeds, he wins the acclaim of his peers. The latter sentiment
is what I am sure initially draws people to participate in events
the rest of society would consider illogical and foolhardy --
but that still draws money-paying spectators out to watch in hordes.
Despite the lure of public acclaim, boxing is not a gentle sport
and a couple of good whacks to the melon in practice are usually
enough therapy to cure the misguided simpleton into pursuing other
interests. After the rude introductory phase in boxing is over,
and after the daredevils, thrill-seekers and other assorted yahoos
have taken their business elsewhere, a certain group of individuals
remain. These athletes continue to pursue the sport for more altruistic
reasons where competitive drive, love of the sport, desire to
achieve, and (believe it or not) maturity and character, now factor
into the equation.
However surprising as it may sound, the mental demands of boxing
are far more taxing than the physical aspects. To successfully
compete in boxing, a person learns to confront his personal fears
and engage in brutally honest and extensive self-evaluation. Previous
measures of status such as material possessions, your parents'
earning power, or the car you drive count for exactly nothing
in the ring when an opponent is seeking to hand-feed you a leather
glove. Boxers soon learn that the only tools they take into a
match are those attributes that they have personally developed.
This is an important point. These learned traits include stamina,
courage, desire and the endurance to outlast adversity. The beautiful
thing about boxing is that once these lessons are learned, they
serve as a frame of reference to draw on if, God-forbid, a person
ever does encounter a real-world crises.
As a season progresses, boxing ceases to be a sport and evolves
into a way of life. Boxers commit to a season of voluntary and
self-enforced stringency. Successful boxers learn to moderate
indulgences, such as in their diet and in social activities, because
these same excesses hider their development and competitiveness.
In return for these sacrifices, the boxer learns permanent lessons
on self-sufficiency, self-confidence, and the insignificance of
fleeting, superficial things. After a couple of weeks of training
the novice boxer will reflect at how much more physically capable
he has become. The sprints do not come close to sucking the air
out of his lungs and inducing a heart attack as they did previously.
The boxer can now crank out pushups and sit-ups like an assembly-line
jackhammer, whereas in early practices he bore more resemblance
to his first car in high school: a physically-unwieldy machine
incapable of running without whines, groans, backfires, and subject
to breakdowns on a moment's notice. The boxer's gaunt face and
physique are also unrecognizable. Off have come the love-handles,
the beer gut, the double chin, the saggy chest, the horizontally-elongated
belly button shaped like a smile, all crafted with love and honed
to perfection over the years from a steady diet of beer, pizza,
fries, chicken wings, 2 a.m. burritos, and other delicacies from
that wonderful universe bound together by cholesterol, salt and
saturated fat.
Boxing is one of those sports where if a person is not introduced
to it early on, chances are that he will never get closer to it
than a television set. This begs the question of how a college
freshman ever finds himself in the ring. The Air Force Academy
had a simple, effective, and parent-like way of bridging this
gap: make it mandatory. Prior to 1995 boxing was a compulsory
freshman PE sport for males at the Academy. An un-forewarned,
newly arrived cadet could have no expectation of ever donning
a pair of boxing gloves. It was therefore more than a little disconcerting
to find out that PE classes at the Academy would be quite different
and would include instruction in water survival, unarmed combat,
judo, wrestling -- and boxing. When you saw a fellow freshman
in the library with a puffy nose or a fat lip, it didn't take
a great deal of detective work to figure out what PE class he
was currently enrolled in, or what possibly lay in store for yourself.
In a school enmeshed with tradition, one that truly epitomizes
the character of the University of Notre Dame is the campus boxing
tournament, the Bengal Bouts. The Bouts are so much more than
an annual sporting event. They are a chance to connect to Notre
Dame's storied history, illuminated by the fact that the original
boxing program was started by none other than legendary football
coach Knute Rockne. The Bouts also exemplify the spirit of service
in the University. The Bengali cause the Bouts have served for
three quarters of a century is so intrinsic, so enmeshed in the
purpose of the boxing team, that the charity, the tournament,
and the boxing club are in essence synonymous.
If this current retro phase is wearing you out, if you're having
trouble growing out your muttonchops, can't find your plaid jacket
or have a hankering to fly Branniff Airlines, it might be easier
to check out the Bengal Bouts. If you live in the vicinity of
a military academy, attending the annual campus tournament will
give you a unique perspective as well. It doesn't get any more
Old School than this.
* * *
December 2003)
