Hard Knock Life Local boxer to fight for Golden Glove





Miya Ward knows how to take punches.

She knows how to give them too, favoring the “old one-two” and popping off shots like a string of firecrackers.

“It makes me feel strong,” she says as she runs a hand along her newly defined biceps. “I guess you could say it gives me something to brag about.”

The 134-lb. ninth grader could brag about a lot more.

She recently took the 2006 Loring Baker USA Championship for her division. The fight was her first and was preceded by a full year of training.

“I was getting hit pretty hard, but I took it,” Miya says as the rest of the Waynesboro Boxing Club takes to the medicine balls and jump ropes. “I fought my way out of the corners and won it.”

Fighting another girl was a novelty for the 14-year-old. There are two other girls in the club, but both are new and not quite ready to go a round with her.

Instead, Miya is thrown in with the guys. “They were afraid of hurting me at first,” Miya laughs as she pulls on her gloves “Not anymore.”

She dances around the ring with her 13-year-old brother Michael who never wastes an opportunity to land one between her eyes. Miya shakes it off like a wet dog and returns the favor with an upper cut to the jaw line.

She suppresses a grin even as she takes a pair to the rib cage. She lives for the stuff.

She dreamed of being a boxer long before she got her chance. She fed the fire with ESPN matches until she got up the courage to fight at the club.

Being the only girl was a little intimidating at first, Miya admits, but now she’s at home amidst the swinging bags and thuds of leather on skin.

“Before I started boxing, I’d start arguments with my brother and cousin just so I could fight them,” Miya says, shooting her cousin Montres a playful smile. “I’ve always liked hitting them. Now I can.”

Miya’s coach, O.J. Frazier, thinks she’s a natural.

He’s trained more than 250 boxers since he started the club eight years ago and says he’s seen few with her talent and desire to win. He expects her to claim the Golden Glove Championship in Columbus on March 17 and says the professional women’s league is within reach.

“Boxers come and go, and they’re all enthusiastic at first,” Frazier said. “But they get hit a few times and it’s a different story. Boxing takes it out of you like no other sport.”

“But Miya … she’s tough,” he counters as she unstraps her headgear and smoothes her hair back into place. “I’m looking for her to win it all.”


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