White collar boxing braced for slow return after lockdown

PARKER, Fury, Buffer and Hearn may be having fun doing the Time Warp all over Twitter, but while boxing’s big beasts dance safe in the knowledge that bumper paydays will eventually return, others on the outskirts of the sport face a tougher fight to get back to business after lockdown.

Maligned by purists and misunderstood by many, the UK’s White Collar Boxing scene was a seemingly unstoppable juggernaut before the coronavirus hit. In recent years it’s trained tens of thousands of Rocky wannabes for one-off bouts in front of hundreds of people, while raising millions for charity. 

Now, from a peak at the beginning of 2020, when virtually every family in the land had someone at least thinking of signing up, the White Collar phenomenon has ground to a juddering halt with the rest of the sport. Eight week courses stopped mid-way, venues cancelled and - perhaps most damaging - no way of signing new punters when it’s impossible to fix a date for fight night.

Will the ‘New Normal’, whenever that begins, see White Collar picking up where it left off? There might be just enough cash left in the main operators’ coffers to keep the pilot light on until the marketing machine is fully fired up again. Even the largest players, led by Derby-based Ultra White Collar Boxing (UWCB), get by on relatively slim margins, with inevitable losses on some nights offset by respectable profits on others that might even eclipse those at the bottom end of pro boxing.

As Ian Goehler of Manchester outfit White Collar Fighter (WCF) says, “We’re not running sports cars on the company, but then again our fixed overheads are very low, so we should still be in OK shape when the virus has passed.”

Most event staff are contractors, covered by ticket sales for specific fight nights, as are other suppliers including venue owners and medical staff. 

WCF, now in its fifth year, has furloughed its four full time staff and reckons it could get back on track well within a month of the UK Government permitting group events, providing they recommence at a level that would allow fight nights with meaningful numbers.

“Filling a room with 500 people might be challenging when there are restrictions on groups and distancing, but running two back-to-back events of 250 guests in the same venue, afternoon and evening with a break in between, could definitely work,” says an optimistic Goehler.

Many of UWCB’s fight nights are bigger, two-ring affairs, where tables for 10 in the ‘VIP’ section with waiter service sell for £400. Standing tickets are around £25 and participants are expected to sell at least 10 of those in order to compete, as well as raising a minimum of £50 for Cancer Research UK (CRUK). The average going to CRUK is nearer £350 per fighter and UWCB has delivered it close to £22m so far.

Other White Collar organisers are happy for fighters to choose their own causes, Either way, it’s sizeable funding that no charity can afford to miss during a prolonged lockdown.  

It’s too early to tell whether the economic fallout from the pandemic could yet wipe out the chances of some organisers setting up shop again. In reality, there is little that is ‘white collar’ about many UK events and training camps in the same way that Gleason’s Gym in New York coined the phrase after the Wall Street bankers and attorneys who took up boxing to let off steam.

Quite simply, many novice fighters signing up for charity fights, particularly the younger ones, already struggle to sell £250 of tickets to friends and family, in addition to running a JustGiving page. For every keen newbie in Rival gloves and customised Suzy Wong shorts, there are often three boxing in everyday trainers and gear from Sports Direct.  A hike in unemployment over the next year won’t redress the balance. 

Detractors would say that ongoing reputational risk to the future of the White Collar scene is a bigger issue threatening its return to stellar growth as much as potential financial pressure. It’s an argument that’s having trouble gaining traction, despite ITV’s April 2020 ‘undercover exposé’ programme about UWCB.

Focusing on the absence of regulation, alleged inadequate medical provision, poorly matched fighters and skill levels falling short of effective self-defence on the night, UWCB - and, by extension, the rest of White Collar - is accused of selling an unrealistic dream to deluded sub-amateurs who could instead end up with a nightmare, or worse.

Without for a split-second suggesting that those badly injured in White Collar bouts, not to mention their families, don’t deserve sympathy and consideration, these cases are extremely rare - in UWCB’s case, in single figures from more than 60,000 trained. By contrast, more have turned pro after trying White Collar with no previous experience.

It’s easy to interview a very tiny minority as a warning; to put an overweight, asthmatic, unfit 52 year old undercover as a novice cruising for a bruising; to insert some mobile phone footage of a few spectators having a punch up. I wouldn’t hold your breath for a Royal Television Society award.

Jon Leonard, UWCB’s founder, was unavailable for comment despite The Pugilist’s strenuous efforts to reach him. It’s a shame, since he’s been hugely instrumental in building the UK scene to what it is today. You can’t blame him for having had enough of the media for the moment.

ITV’s view of White Collar is very different from my own experience of training for UWCB’s Woking event in November 2019.  Any lardy, wheezing over-fifties were among the first to duck out of a group of around 100 men and women that shrank to 45. Only one stand-in made up the numbers on the night, as I remember. The training, from start to finish, was professional, supportive and good-humoured.

I trained very hard, since I was approaching 55 (although pretty fit) and didn’t want to look like a plonker. I was fairly matched and, happily for me, I won my fight. None of that stopped me, over eight weeks, breaking my nose, bruising ribs and being mildly concussed. But this was boxing, not badminton. 

The event was superbly staged, with more than 700 tickets sold and there was little or no trouble. Our hands were professionally wrapped. There were several medics on hand. The referee was top-notch. Nobody was badly hurt. Fight night exceeded most competitors’ expectations and one guy later wrote on Facebook that it was the best night of his life. 

He won’t have been the first to say it in a White Collar competition run by any of the main operators. On another level, it’s often said that boxing has saved several troubled souls from crime, prison and involvement in a wide range of unwholesome pursuits. Even on an eight week course it’s also supported mental health, a sense of purpose and prevented suicide. These elements are invariably forgotten when reporting infrequent life-changing misfortunes in the ring.

Positioning White Collar as a force for good may be a leap too far for the doubters; nonetheless, boxing as a whole should be generous enough to recognise the scene’s contribution to helping grow and sustain interest in a sport that is riding high in Britain. 

The present depth of talent across all divisions at a pro level hasn’t been seen for a long time and British boxing is in very good shape. No wonder fans want to have a go, sometimes a bit late in life, with no ambition to give up the day job. Those same fans will, hopefully before too long, once again fill the seats at pro fights from York Hall to Wembley and beyond, probably glad to be going home in one piece.

This article appeared in The Pugilist, Issue One 1 May 2020