Updated On: September 11, 2015

Erica Adjei.

Photo: Steve Kingsman

 

By Brian Trota

Erica Adjei didn’t care much for sports when she was younger. But on her 18th birthday, it all changed when a friend made a comment that would be a turning point in her life.

“One of my friends had a registration form to the Beaver Boxing Club. I said we should all do it together. And one of my other friends said that I couldn’t box because I was a girl. He said I would quit even if I started boxing,” recounts Adjei. “What he said sparked something in me. I took it as a challenge. And a couple of months later I walked into the gym and that’s how it all started.”

Eight years later, Adjei is now the reigning Canadian women’s champion in the 54 kg division, and as of August’s Ringside world championships, she’s now got a major international title to her name as well.

Billed as the planet’s largest amateur boxing competition, the Ringside worlds are an event run by a boxing apparel manufacturer featuring around 1,500 competitors across all divisions.

Adjei beat opponents from Kansas, Toronto and Vancouver to win the women’s under-120 lbs. division at the four-day event in Missouri.

“I was on cloud nine,” smiles the Montreal-born, Ottawa-raised boxer. “All the hard work in the gym, all the dieting, all the sacrifices I endured were worth it.”

Adjei has produced plenty of great results in recent years – twice selected as the city’s top boxer at the Ottawa Sports Awards, and also receiving Boxing Ontario’s 2014 senior female athlete of the year honour. But it was watching from the audience that sparked the 2012 Carleton University grad’s Olympic dreams.

“I was a spectator at the boxing finals at the (Toronto 2015) Pan Am Games and it was an amazing experience,” identifies Adjei, who’s now preparing for an early-October competition in Russia. “Before that, I had no ambitions to go to the Olympics or the Pan Am Games, but after being at the final ceremonies when they raised the flag and awarded the medals, and to hear the athletes’ national anthems… It gave me goosebumps.

“I decided that I wanted to be (in that position) and reach that pinnacle.”

Still a young Olympic sport, women’s boxing does not currently include Adjei’s 54 kg weight class at the Pan Am or Olympic Games, so she would have to move up to 60 kg or down to 51 to take a shot at the big stage.

Based on the 5 years he’s worked with Adjei, Beaver coach Greg Gayle – who Adjei credits for much of her success – doesn’t doubt his athlete could make it happen.

“She is the best boxer at the gym. She is a confident fighter and has great speed. She is a terrific and wonderful person and never has a bad thing to say about anyone. She is a very humble person in a very demanding sport,” Gayle details. “She can go as far as she wants. It’s all up to her.”

Source: Ottawasports.com