Friday Tournament: Ladies' Night

I'm told by unreliable sources that female boxers outnumber the males by two-to-one in SL. If that's the case, then they've been sorely underrepresented at Averlast tournaments, at least since I've started attending. My friend jesica has, up until last night, been standing up for the distaff side of the roster all by her lonesome. With Karine having to forsake her heavyweight contention for the time being in order to keep things running (more on that in another post), and others simply not stepping forward on tournament night for whatever reason, it's been lean times for fans of the Sisterhood of the Squared Circle.

Like I said, until last night. Miansha Beaumont and Buffy Soderstrom stepped forward to join jesica on the tournament ladder, equaling in number the males, being DeadMan Ivory, snake5608 Boa, and myself.

Miansha stepped into the ring with snake to kick off the night. It was a lively, back and forth affair, with both fighters giving and getting with vigor. It was honestly too close for me to call. I had given it to Miansha, but when it came down to points, the judges picked snake as the winner in what had to be a close decision. Everyone agreed that it could have gone either way.

jesica was next, having been paired up against DeadMan (yes, whether by chance or design, Hot had turned the lightweight tournament into the Battle of the Sexes). After the "rock 'em, sock 'em" action of the previous fight, this one represented a change in gears. Both fighters were heavily defensive, seldom getting within striking distance of each other. Where Miansha vs. snake was a brawl, jesica vs. DeadMan was a more methodical contest as each fighter tried to maneuver the other into the best position to strike. In the end, jesica came out on top, giving her her first official tournament victory. As the person who had been her trainer when she first came to Averlast, I couldn't have been prouder.

Buffy and I ended the first round of the tournament with our bout. I had met Buffy earlier in the week at the gym while she and her husband main steady, Chak, sparred over who ate the last double chocolate chip cookie. I figured they were either pulling my leg or they had a regard for snacks worthy of the Irken Empire. Well, either way, Chak was in the crowd and Buffy was in the ring, so I have a good guess as to who won that fight.

It was an impression reinforced shortly after the opening bell. Buffy has an aggressive style similar to my own, and she came at me ferociously. Couple that with an unexpected wave of lag, which made mounting any kind of defense a difficult proposition, and it was clear that I had my work cut out for me.

When she knocked me out of the ring halfway through the first round, I knew I was in trouble.

Okay, to review: Lag hindering movement. Hungry, talented newcomer bearing in on me.

This was no time for finesse, and so it turned into a brawl. Buffy and I traded blows back and forth for the next two rounds, knocking each other across the ring, and the occasional pop into the air. We both saved ourselves from KO's, and it was anyone's fight.

Then, in the third round, I repaid her for that first round KO by doing the same. I got the feeling that things were paying off, though it was still too close for me to call.

Choosing to brawl is a risky strategy, and one that doesn't always pay off. It all comes down to who can land the punches first.

So when the decision came down, I was more than a little surprised to learn that it had paid off, and that I had won by three points. That, by the way, is the point value of a single KO. So yeah: Risky, stupid strategy.

I'd like to add here that I think that Buffy is one hell of a competitor, and immediately after the decision was read I told her that she could get a rematch from me anytime. The way she fights, I may not have a choice in the matter.

So that left me with a bye to the final match, to face the winner of matchup between snake and jesica. jesica still played her defensive game, but still got some good tags and a KO on snake. snake, for his part, returned the favor, and scored a KO on jes at the final bell in what I'll term a "controversial" call. But as it's not my call to make, I'll leave it at that.

In the end, it came down to another draw. snake has a knack for these things, it seems.

This left a quandary, though. As there was only one other prospective opponent left in the tourney, the draw couldn't be handled the way it was last week, where both combatants advanced to different rounds. So, after much consideration (maybe a little too much, even), it came down to "pick a number" from Hot and snake advanced to the final.

So that was the end of jes' night, but she completed the event without a loss. Still, I'd rather have faced her, if only for the whole "student vs. teacher" angle.

So it was down to me and snake. Unfortunately, I think his slightly longer journey up the tournament ladder took its toll on him. I KOed him at least twice per round, though not enough to win the match by that means. snake never gives up, and he got in a few good shots, but I never left the ring while fighting him that night.

So that's me at 7-0 now. I had to leave before the middleweight festivities started, thanks to RL and the need for a steady paycheck, so I can't report on them here. But congratulations to Santana for another successful MW title defense.

Before I conclude, I'd like the reader to consider a little something here when going over the results: Of the three women who fought that night, the two novices gave their more experienced opponents the fights of their lives, while the more experienced one won and advanced. And they're only going to improve with time and practice.

Keep sparring, boys. ;-)

A quick step away from the ring.

One of my frequent peeves about SL is how hard it is to find a decent suit or menswear in general.

Well screw that noise.

UPDATE: Then again, maybe not. Guess I'll just have to go and see for myself this weekend.

My good deed for the day.

The link to Cale Vinson's SkirtSitter script in the SLNN story that touches on it takes me to a page full of sponsored ads being held by GoDaddy. I don't know if it's just me somehow or if it's a widespread problem, but fortunately a Russian SL fanpage has posted the script, along with instructions, to its wiki.

The usual butterflies.

Ah, there they are now, right on schedule: The usual performance-anxiety butterflies that hit me anywhere between 24 and 36 hours before the Friday tournament.

Last week, a friend IMed me as we each waited our turns in the ring: "Nervous?"

My truthful answer: "Always."

Really, who could blame anyone for a case of nerves? After all, in sparring, if you get knocked out of the practice ring and wind up kissing the row of lockers in the upstairs locker room, you might feel a little embarrassed, get some coaching when you get back within chat range, and, at worst, a little ribbing from your sparring partner if you happen to be friends (Kev Hastings and I engage in epic trash talk battles that far eclipse our efforts in the ring, and he ain't no slouch in that department, either).

But come Friday, it's your record. Not to mention the strangers in the stands expecting to see something from you, and the possibility of press and YouTube... hell, who wouldn't be nervous? It's the human condition. In my honest opinion, anybody who says they aren't nervous before a fight is either lying or seriously underestimating the other fighter.

So yeah, I understand nerves. That is, I understand right up to the point where nerves becomes the reason for not participating in the tournament at all.

I'm not here to name names, or put a gun to somebody's head and march them into the ring. If someone isn't feeling ready yet, I could write a blog post long enough to fill a Gutenberg Bible and it wouldn't make that person feel any readier. But when you get right down to it, in my opinion, Friday night at Averlast is what it's all about. This is where all of the sparring, all of the training, all of the advice and jokes and coping with lag is leading to: That time under the virtual lights and the simulated roar of the crowd, with your heart pounding in your ears and the sound of leather on flesh as you dodge and weave, putting in every ounce of your best effort.

It's been the lesson of my life that we don't regret the things we do nearly as much as the things we could have done, but didn't. And the people I've talked to after the matches, whether they were "done in one" or took it all the way to the main event more or less described the experience the same way: What a rush!

IM Hot Rockin or Karine Koba and let them know you're in, 'kay? 'Kay.

Potentialities.

So while I was cruising through SLNN hoping to catch Vox Mullen's article on the Friday tournament (I still live in hope), two other items caught my eye, each with a potential to add a new layer to life at the gym.

The first is the appearance of new scripts for flexi skirts. Since my primary responsibility at Averlast is to design new boxing gear, anything that makes clothing drape more naturally on an av is of interest to me. I can already think of a few applications, provided that experimentation turns out like I'd hope.

The second is BioLabs' projected rollout of natural bodily functions and reactions for avs. Boxing, I'm sure I don't need to tell you, is often a bloody sport. BioLabs is working on a system that would allow avs to, among other things, react realistically to injuries, including bleeding. Of course it remains to be seen if the system would respond to a bullet in a different manner than it would to, say, a punch to the nose, not to mention possibly being additional fuel for lag, but the potential is certainly intriguing.

Respect.

Yesterday I documented my part in the Friday tournament. This time out I'd like to focus on one particular incident that stuck out in my mind. It was a minor one, and the party involved may have just been kidding. But still, it makes one think.

After the match between Rickyy Smit and snake5608 Boa was fought to a draw, the two fighters, now out of the ring, exchanged congratulations for a fight well fought. Not at all an unusual sight for anyone who's spent time in the Averlast gym during sparring throughout the week.

But then an audience member reacted. It was something along the lines of: "What's all this 'good fight' stuff? We wanna see blood!"

Again, verbal irony being notoriously tough to convey online, he might have been joking.

Then again, he might not.

We seem to have developed in America a sports culture that not only demands victory for the winners, but for the losers to be not only defeated, but demeaned, humiliated, and probably assaulted.

You see it everywhere (ask anyone who dares wear a Giants jersey to an Eagles home game), and in boxing it manifests itself in pre-fight interviews that nearly degenerate into slugfests. Incidents like this, of course, guarantee heavy rotation of the clips on ESPN and the local news, thus generating more publicity for the fight. This gives promoters very little incentive to discourage these childish displays, beyond protecting their investments by making sure that the fighters don't actually break each others' jaws while the gloves are still off.

And so, one highly publicized incident at a time, we become conditioned to the idea that this is the norm.

Thus a display of actual (gasp!) sportsmanship elicits a reponse akin to disbelief.

Of course, Averlast has a different culture than professional boxing (in addition to, of course, not being real). Fighters aren't surrounded by entourages devoted only to them, with private sparring partners and managers and press agents and whatnot. We have no way to hone our skills except with each other. Anybody carrying on like Mike Tyson at a bachelor party will soon find themselves persona non grata.

Take, for instance, my relationship with Alma Despres, my division's champion. I make no bones about it: I want her title. Anybody competing in my division, or any division, would say the same about the championship.

But I would have to be a complete jerk to let that be the sole definition of our relationship. We sparred yesterday, for instance. Any fight manager in the world seeing his fighter go up against a likely opponent just for practice would choke on his own bile at the sight, but this is the norm at Averlast. In the process, we talk about different things: Food. Pets. Some politics, even (we both share a loathing of President Bush, but of the two of us I'm the only one to has to share a country with him as well).

If my only thoughts were of the title, I would have missed out on a chance to get to know an interesting and compassionate human being.

Of course, there was trash talk, too. But it was a privelige of friendship, rather than a product of malice.

Great Scott! I've been YouTubed!

Well, this is my surprise of the day. SL videographer Rom Ireton secretly filmed my match with Shaun Arliss from the September 14th tournament. Interesting.