A GIRL from Chingford who fell in love with boxing after she pummelled her Dad’s punch-bag could now fight for Britain in the 2012 Olympics.
Shakira Ley has just been given £2,000 to continue her training after judges were impressed at her feat of winning the national female championships twice in two years.
Now that women’s boxing has been admitted to the Olympic catalogue of events, Shakira has a chance of competing on the very biggest stage.
Talking at the One Complete Solution (OCS) Young Sports Person Award bash, where she triumphed in the London category, Shakira was already dreaming about what it would be like to fight for Britain.
“That would be wicked. I could just catch the bus. No words can describe it. It’s great that it’s your home,” she said.
Nine years after Shakira first thumped her father’s training bag and received lessons from him, Shakira is facing up to what she needs to do now to make it to London 2012.
“Training, training, tra-ining extra hard and keeping in my mind that the next person is training harder than me,” she said.
At last Thursday’s awards bash, Shakira was one of 11 winners from different parts of the country.
Chris Cracknell, the chief executive of OCS, which offers various services like catering and waste disposal, said: “Our winners have gone on to achieve great things for our country and we will continue to support our sporting future as we race towards 2012.”
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