Boxer’s Toughest Fight Is Looming
Richie Daunt chalked up a “W” in the first round of this year’s Road to the Garden tournament last Thursday at the New York Athletic Club.
That he did so without throwing a jab was, he said during a conversation at the MuvStrong fitness studio in East Hampton Saturday morning, somewhat disappointing (to his sizable entourage as well, presumably), though the bye he received gave him a chance to scout his quarterfinal-round opponent, Christian Cangiolosi, Italy’s national 152-pound champion. Their bout is on Saturday at the Heavy Hitters Boxing Club in Ronkonkoma.
The coming fight with Cangiolosi “will definitely be my biggest fight to date,” said Daunt, a wiry, hard-punching 28-year-old Montauker who has moved up from the novice to the elite open division, with a possible pro career beckoning. “I might as well get paid for getting punched in the head for free all the time,” he said with a smile.
As for Cangiolosi, “He’s got a stiff jab, and has a little bit of a reach on me. I’ll have to cut off the ring on him. I’ll have to establish my jab, and I’ll have to have head movement. If I keep my head there he’ll keep punching it. . . . They’re picking him to win this tournament . . . I’ll give him a fight to remember, that’s for sure.”
But the most important thing, said Daunt, who is in his third Golden Gloves tournament and has 15 fights under his belt, “is conditioning. It comes down to this: When you’re in shape, you win — before you even get into the ring. When you’re not in shape, you don’t. I’m putting the right things into my body now, chicken, asparagus, sweet potatoes. . . . Eighty percent of it is diet.”
Diet and workouts, of course. He trains two or three days a week at Vargas Boxing in Patchogue (his trainer is Mike Vargas, the gym’s owner), and trains frequently as well at the Montauk Lake Club, at Body Tech in the Montauk Playhouse, at his cousin Leo Daunt’s workout room at the Albatross Motel, and at MuvStrong, where he is a personal trainer.
Asked what a typical workout might entail, Daunt said, “I’ll run on a treadmill for four or five miles, going as hard as I can in spurts and then jogging, I’ll flip a truck tire, I’ll hit it with a sledgehammer, I’ll push a sled with a lot of weight on it, jump rope, work on the speed bag, the double-end bag. . . .”
Sparring was critical, he said, and for that he often has to travel far afield, to the Freeport P.A.L. or to K.O. Boxing in Jamaica, Queens, for instance.
“I live an hour and a half from the gym. The guys I’m fighting live five minutes from a gym. If it wasn’t for Juan and Louis [Mancilla], who are like my second family, I wouldn’t have anyone to spar with out here. The Vargas family too. They’ve been so good to me. My trainer has been great. He gets me fights and takes me to them. You need someone like that. You can’t do it by yourself. Alex Vargas, Mike’s son, beat Cangiolosi in the semifinals last year. He’s a pro now. He’s 3-0. He had his first knockout win last night at the Paramount, in Huntington.”
“I started boxing with the Mancillas when I was 18,” Daunt continued, “but I was messing around. I didn’t start competing until I was 23. I had one bout when I was 23, and one when I was 25. At 27, I had, like, eight bouts, and from 27 to 28 I had 15. I’ve had 15 with Vargas Boxing. . . . Before, I wasn’t serious. You can’t half-ass it. Every time you do, you lose. . . . I see myself fighting as a pro for a few years. For sure. Why not? I can always fall back on cooking. There will always be a restaurant to work for, but boxing won’t always be there.”
