Team Alberta came our swinging but fell to Team Ontario at Ballroom Boxing II over the weekend. While locals Shan Patino, Joey Zhang, and Morgan Johnson were victorious, their teammates dropped their matchups.
Organizer John Stanley says regardless of the outcome, it was a great opportunity for the fighters to get some rounds in.
“Grande Prairie just likes to support its own. Since I moved into the city four years ago, I was really amazed at how for an event of any substance, they’ll jump on board and just support the hell out of it.”
Stanley says the event was a success overall with both corporate and general attendance up from the first event in 2018.
He says the idea of ‘Ballroom Boxing’ is to take the sport back into a more intimate setting. Stanley adds the first shows he remembers hearing about came out of the eastern United States before he started running his own shows in eastern Canada.
“It was actually called ‘Boxing at the Ballroom’. I saw it and I thought it sounded interesting so I tried it back there and it worked. When I moved to Grande Prairie I thought, if we are going to do a show here why not try that?”
Ballroom Boxing III is set for November 2019.