New boxing club opens in Ballykelly

THE first ever training session of a brand new cross community boxing club was held in Ballykelly on Tuesday night, making use of the new community centre at Lough View House.

Ballykelly Boxers is hoping to attract new members from both sides of the community in Ballykelly and farther afield to their newly formed club.

A highly successful first training session was held last night, with both children and adults taking part. The club is currently in the process of gaining accreditation from the relevant boxing authorities in Londonderry and Limavady, and are hoping to be a fully fledged, accredited and popular club in the coming weeks.

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Speaking ahead of the first training session, Club Secretary for the newly formed Ballykelly Boxers club, Rob Montieth, said: “We are still in our infancy at this stage, we have just literally started out.

“The Chairman of the Club, Andrew Peoples, it is his idea. He wanted to put something together for the whole community and we decided to put the feelers out, and see what people might be attracted to. We put it on facebook and came out with the idea for the boxing club.

“We have a fully qualified coach on board and ready to start right away. Betty McNerlin from North West Lifelong Learning has been able to help us out with getting the use of the new community facility at Lough View House, where the old army houses used to be.

“The first training session focussed on circuit training, padwork and that kind of thing. When we get people to a level of fitness we are going to start working on sparring for those who are interested and a bit later on down the line we are going to have people into competitions and that type of thing.

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“Obviously we have now got the location, so it is all about getting the equipment in. We are at the stage we we have to beg, borrow and steal what we can, but we have an application in with the Sports Lottery Fund, so fingers crossed because any funding we can get will go a long way.”

Mr Montieth was also very keen to stress that the whole reason for the club was to bring people of all ages and from both sides of the community together. He said: “The club is open to everyone. We want the youngsters in – they are the ones who are going to be making a difference in years to come, but that is not to say that we don’t want to have the adults in as well. It is open to everybody.

“It is very much going to be a cross community club. The last thing we would want people to be saying is that it is only for one side of the community. 100 per cent cross community and everyone is going to be made to feel welcome – particularly with it being in the location that it is, the ex-army houses. It is excellent being in here and able to have the opportunity to bring both sides together.

“There won’t be any messing about – it is a boxing club and we are going to instil discipline.”

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Mr Monteith was keen to attract new members. He said: “I would encourage everyone to come along. All you have to do is come along on the Tuesday night.”

Training for Ballykelly Boxers starts at 7.00pm on Tuesday nights at Lough View House in Ballykelly.