BOXERS TAKE CENTER STAGE

[sixcol_five_last]
By Errol “DynamiX” Alegre, Jr.

The Guam Amateur Boxing Federation held yet another amateur boxing tournament Saturday night at the Dededo Sports Complex in Harmon. A seven-bout fight card featured 14 fighters putting their boxing skills to the test and aiming to go home with a trophy.

Although Javier Peralta did a unique job of ducking and weaving his head to avoid punches, Zach Tenorio was still able to find an opening as he lands this clean jab. (photo by Errol Alegre, Jr.)

Locally renowned Jiu-Jitsu artist, Zachery Tenorio, showed the crowd his stand-up game as he outlasted the agility and quickness of Javier Peralta and won by unanimous decision in the main event of the night. Tenorio, fighting out of Carlson Gracie, knew he had a tough opponent on his hands as Peralta, fighting out of Ravals Gym, made use of his lengthy arms to land good shots to the head of Tenorio while keeping his distance from any counter shots. However, although Peralta had the advantage outside, Tenorio used his quick feet to get inside to land shorter, stronger three-to-five punch combos at a time.

When asked what his game plan was coming into the fight Tenorio stated that, “In the first round I wanted to just go easy in, easy out then pick it up in the second round.”

Tenorio did just that as he came out after the bell with a flurry of punches to the head and body that forced Peralta to the ropes for a brief moment. Although Peralta began to show signs of fatigue as he continually dropped and weaved his head around waist-level in attempt to avoid the onslaught of Tenorio, Peralta still was able to land solid, straight counter punches to Tenorio as he moved back after throwing his own combinations.

Rion Alfred lands a solid jab through the defense of Jose Arriola in the fifth bout of the night. (photo by Errol Alegre, Jr.)

Tenorio continued his combinations in the beginning of the third round until he was deducted a point after pushing Peralta out of the ropes. Tenorio assumed that the fight could go either way at this point, so he knew what he had to do; he continued to land punches in flurries and after numerous shots to the body, finally knocked down Peralta in the closing seconds of the fight, regaining his deducted point.

”It was a good thing [that I brought him down] because I got that point taken away from me. I was really scared that it was going to affect me in the decision if I didn’t finish the fight.” Tenorio stated. “I’m not going to lie; I was getting a little bit gassed. So after he went down I said to myself, ‘Oh okay, finally’.”

For the rest of the fights:

Jarine Paulino (Counter Shot) def. Nathaniel Galvez, Jr. (DLX) by unanimous decision.

In the first round, it looked like Galvez was going to go home with an easy win as he easily got through the soft defense of Paulino with combinations. But in the second round, Paulino came out with aggressive punches to the head and body of Galvez. It was only a matter of time before Paulino dropped Galvez to his knees with a one-two combination; he brought up the defense of Galvez with a straight right then landed a clean body shot that brought him down. Although Galvez was given five minutes to recover from a low blow at the end of the second round, Paulino’s aggression and determination was not diminished as he punched his way to the win.

Adrienne Francisco tags Rudel O’Connor with a right uppercut forcing him to stay on the defensive side for the rest of the fight. (photo by Errol Alegre, Jr.)

Rion Alfred (Ravals Gym) def. Jose Arriola (DLX) by unanimous decision.

Alfred definitely had the better stand-up game as he continually landed clean shots to the head of Arriola. Arriola’s knees buckled not once, but twice in the second round after the continuous onslaught from Alfred began to take its toll.

Adrienne Francisco (DLX) def. Rudel O’Connor (Kontendas) by referee stoppage in first round.

Francisco started the round with hard punches to O’Connor who stayed wrapped in a shell behind his defense. Although shots to the head of O’Connor were not getting through, the intelligent Francisco knew that body shots would bring down that defense. After O’Connor’s hands began to drop, Francisco began to land even cleaner shots to his head that eventually led to the stop by referee, Cano Cruz.

Vince Camp (DLX) def. Mark Lao (Counter Shot) by unanimous decision.

Jared Santos (Counter Shot) def. Joey Castro (DLX) by split decision.

Jerome Sajo (Ravals) def. Aljay Kinashiro (Counter Shot) by split decision.

[/sixcol_five_last][ubm_premium_banner_rotation banners=38, 39, 44 interval=9 width=120 height=600 orderby=rand]

[fbshare url=”http://www.gspnlive.com/?p=15075″ type=”button”][fblike url=”http://www.gspnlive.com/?p=15075″ style=”standard” showfaces=”false” width=”450″ verb=”like” font=”arial”]