 It is the touch line here on Y254. Beautiful Saturday afternoon when we talk about the sport and now we turn our attention to boxing in the year 2023 and how it has been going on for Kenya and all around the world because the events of boxing are also happening. Joining me to discuss boxing is a sports journalist, a passionate man when it comes to boxing was covered the Kenyan hit squad boxing time and it has been a great experience for him. Dan Calculia is the name. Welcome to the touch line Y254. Thank you very much. It has been a minute. Yes, it has been a while. The invitations are not coming, I am wondering why. You are all around the world. Yes, but we have been moving a bit. The international calendar has been so busy so we are trying to cope with it. So probably that is why we have not had time to discuss. Finally, you are here and let's kick off with the hit squad. You were almost 10 to 12 days in Cuba for hit squad training. How was it for hit squad? That was a dream come true for each and every member of the national team including officials. We followed him personally when I was young. He was one of the former national champion then. He was called the late Don Juanena. He gave me a shot in Cuba and it inspired me to become the star that I was. I was able to get a national team because of that inspiration but during those times when I was playing I never dreamed that I would go to Cuba. I would like to congratulate Wazeria Babuna Mamba. He was able to activate an argument that had been signed between Kenya and Cuba to have a state program. That is what we used to go for the training that we went in Cuba. It is a wonderful place. The structure they have is very different to what we have here. We got a privilege that I think you are one of the few teams that have visited Cuba and trained with the national team, the top team. Other teams go there and you go and do training sessions with subclubs. This time around you are lucky enough that you went there and you are able to interact with the national team both for men and women. We have a gym which is very famous known as Afinka. Before we talk about the agreement, how did the agreement come about? The agreement was signed during the time of Wazeria Chesa. Unfortunately it was not activated until now when Babu Babuna Mamba came in. He was able to work with his office and activate that agreement. We were lucky that it came during the time when we were preparing for the Olympics. Even though the time was quite short, but it was very impactful and we learnt a lot. I wish we could get some more time and take a team that is a bit younger. When we look at our team, some of our members of the national team are adding a maybe past 30. I think if we are able to go there with guys who are much younger and people who are younger, they will learn a lot and they will become great champions because we have seen what they are doing. So the agreement is not one of things? No, it's continuous. They expect us to go there. We are also able to maybe ask them to come over and help us in taping talent here locally. So it's a good arrangement that we have with one of the top boxing nation in the world. There are so many lessons that we can take from them. Especially the trackers that they have will go for training there. It's so different from what we have here. They don't train for so many hours. Like us here, sometimes they go for training sessions and we start at nine. We finish at about one. There are two hours maximum. If you go for two hours, it's very long for them. One and a half hours and they are through and they have earned everything. When it comes to spying, they are able to do some innovation. They have so many rings within the facility. Lafika. Lafika is so special. I don't know, probably because it has produced so many champions. Because I think most of the world champions, Olympic champions, have gone to training. They come through the gym. Actually, it's like a complex because they live there. They live in the gym. Lafika is a big compound about 10 acres. The boxers live within. They have hostels there. And there are apartments. The guys who are world champions, they have their private rooms. Special. Yes. And the ones who have joined the national team and they haven't made a name for themselves. They have dormitories where they share together with others. So, it's a very special arrangement. And when you go there and you see the champion at the likes of Julia De La Cruz. And it's very humble. Five times world champion, two times Olympic champion. And he interacts with them just like any other person. You did know that he's the biggest name in boxing in the world at the moment. Yes. But they are so humble. I think what they have is some form of interaction in them. I think from the time of Fidel Castro. Yes. So, they take it like they are fighting for country. And every time we are going for training. We meet, they parade. Then the captain goes to the end. And ask them in Spanish if they are ready for training. And everybody is safe for about five seconds. And then everybody says we are ready for training. It's like a military conflict. Yes. That's how we operate it. We are trying to learn what is it. What is it they are asking now with language barrier. We don't understand what exactly they are asking. So, later on when you go off the main national team and women national team don't train together. Yes. So, the women train in a different gym called Panamericana. And the men are in Lafinka. So, what happened was our women team used to go for training in the morning. To train with women national team. And our men go in the afternoon to train with the men national team. Wow. What were the key differences that now brought those key lessons to the women team? I think one of the main differences was that the team stay together. They have a team they have selected. Which stays in camp about 30 people. 30-40. So, when they have a championship they reduce the numbers. But typically the national team has about 30 members. And these 30 members are in camp. They stay there, they feed there and they earn something from the government. Right from where they are. And then they have you see now even in terms of gym. The team where we train has three boxing rings. And they also how they how they how they hold it have been made. It's like the surface has been padded. Yes. Where in the sense that even the all sections of the gym can be used as a ring. Yes. And when it comes to the time of starting. They do so they are innovations where they have ropes which go get attached to the ring. So you create different rings all across the gym. Yes. So that when you are doing sparring everybody is doing sparring at the same time. Wow. Here in Kenya we have a sparring session. We have two people fighting because we only have one ring. Yes. So it's only two. So we are waiting for all of them to be able to compete with us for so much time. But there what's happening was we agree when we coming we are doing six rounds. Yes. So these six rounds it means we are going to do sparring with six different people. So we will just be moving from one ring to the other. Yes. That was very different. We had never seen that before. And it comes to punching bag. They have about more than 20 punching bags. Everybody is doing punching bag at the same time. Same time. We have speed balls and all that. So you see the investment that has been done there is massive. And it doesn't go without saying that's why they have achieved so much success. Yes. And I think it's also becomes repetitive because when you have the structure where you have youth boxing because we also met the youth boxing team. Yes. And apparently it's like where they come they thought of school. Oh. So these guys attend classes. Classes. And training is part of school. Yes. Oh. So like when you were there we were told that they had gone for a break. Now schools reopen when you were there. Yes. And now the youth team came. So these guys are from home so they wouldn't participate in sparring because they have just come back. So now school has opened. Now they come to the camp where the boats are where Americana is. The Panamika and Stein where that's where the Gulf team is. So that's where the school is. The boats attend schools there and do training there. And you know this culture of training the champions and the youth team together. Yes. And then now when they become aware they go to Lafinka. I think I see something in them. That journey brings something different. Yes. It inspires them very differently. And you can easily see why every year they are producing guys who are becoming champions. Yes. Because you are learning from the best. Living with them, seeing what they do and trying. So in the process you become good. You talked about it was a learning experience for everybody for the boxers. What about their administration administratively? What did you learn from them? There's also a lot. There's a lot also we learned administratively. How they have invested in terms of its technology, in terms of equipment. Although some look very basic. But they have different compartments. Like for them okay me I was trying to study them and document what they have. Yes. And they do a lot of coordination sessions. They have a different room where they go and do that just within Lafinka. Yes. They have like the main team has two doctors who live with the team in the camp. Yes. And when they have after they have done the sparring. They used to sneak out of the team and we wonder where they have gone. Yes. Then we followed them and found they were going to do coordination sessions. Yes. And some of the boxers also benefited from that. You go and those the coordination sessions. They were telling me that is a key secret of what made them to be what they are. Yes. Because they are very intensive and the mobility that you see them do in the ring. Yes. Is something that they also practice a lot. Yes. Though now to me I was worried to them because now I was trying to record everything that they are doing. Yes. So that when I come back I have the information of exactly what they do. Yes. And how they do it. So the coaches were very good to me. Okay. I am known to them. Yes. They are my friends. Yes. We take each other's brothers. Yes. And they were very happy to help me around. Yes. So they gave me access to all the areas that they have. So in terms of administration you see how the leadership has provided for administrators given offices within the figure. Yes. They ensure that there is somebody who makes food for them. They ensure they have doctors. Yes. They have physios. And they are different coaches. Yes. So the coach supervises what these other coaches are doing. Yes. Yes. So you might think it is a very idle person because it comes to us, stands, observes and it does nothing. Yes. But the coaches are very busy trying to work with the boxers, see how they can help them improve from time to time. Yes. Even with that we I think we broke protocol because at some point we managed to get our girls to go and train Lafinka and they trained with the men doing training with them. Yes. And in this case they are very humble. Yes. You know how during our firing sessions here sometimes the men give the girls a very tough time. Yes. They are you know their training is not about trying to knock somebody out. It's so technical. It's just trying to learn. Aha. They don't somebody doesn't come trying to disape. It's not a fight. Yes. It's very technical. Just trying to outscore you. Yes. If it's movement so you know some of our girls are getting frustrated because somebody is just holding you, moving about you. It's like we're chasing a moving target. And it was just a wonderful sight to see. And I think as a country we are privileged to have such an opportunity. Yes. But I'm thinking it will be more useful to those who are there. It's inspired them to improve themselves individually because it's boxing an individual sport. Yes. I think going forward we have a wonderful opportunity that we can explore of having to go for training sessions in their place. And that way I think it will take as long as it might to be able to see ourselves producing champion who can be able to conquer the world. The thing is now after Cuba direct to Dakar. Yes. For the Olympic qualifiers. We made it to the semifinals in Elizabeth and Diego. Yes. A question will be when you look at our boxers now after the training in Cuba and now going for the Olympic qualifiers. When they put what they learnt in Cuba into play. How did you see the results from them? First when you consider the overall performance in terms of the qualification. Yes. It might not show the exact output that we got out of the training in Cuba. But the first few days in fact we were so lucky. The first bout that we had in Dakar was for captain Mwonses Mugunde 2016 olympic bros medalist and 2015 world champion Muhammad Rabi of Morocco. Yes. And Mugunde knocked Rabi out in second round which was an amazing performance. And immediately after that bout the coaches from Nigeria, South Africa. Everything changed. He was telling me Q is working. Wow. Yes. It was such a great momentum that we got out of that. Because everybody now was thinking about Cuba. Yes. That is a difference between the K and Jumas. Rabi is Africa champion. That's the other day. 3 weeks before we were in Africa championship and it took all in middle age. So it was expected that Rabi was going to win again as Mugunde. Who in Africa championship got a bronze medal. So when we got to Dakar it was obviously Mugunde was an underdog. But when he knocked Rabi out then we thought everybody there was surprised by the performance. And then I think that first day we had 4 bouts, we won 3 and lost 1. Which was wonderful. And the fights were very tough. I think the performance of most of the guys was commendable. The tickets were very few. And it's something I had highlighted before. Because the quotas that were given to Africa are very limiting indeed. And I had an opportunity to discuss even with the leadership of boxing unit who are the organizers of the Olympic qualifiers. And they agreed with me even though they were also trying to paint a picture that number of boxers in the Olympic have been reduced by 40. So we are going to have less 40. Last time we had about 206 boxers in Tokyo Olympics. But this time around we are going to have 248. And Africa will be taking how many now? Now for the Africa Olympic qualifier the entire continent was given 18 slots. So for men... And those are considered men and women now? No, it's separate. For men it was only gold. So only 7 men have qualified so far. And for women it's 11. And for women it was gold and silver in the first 5 weights. Which is a flyweight, bantam, feather, lightweight and welter. And in mid-weight where our Antego is they only needed gold medalist only. And unfortunately Antego was fighting again as heavyweight champion of the world Madka Dija from Morocco and Dija won on points. So that was a bit unfortunate for us because at least men now considering in all other ways the finalists were qualifying. For Antego it was a bit unfortunate that she was not able to qualify. She'll have to go for the repachages that are coming. So Africa in general was given 18 slots? Yeah. For men 7, for women 11. How... When you look at that considering 54 countries to select 7 men how tough does that look because 7 men out of... because every country sending boxers to their country. And I was trying to explain to the guy in charge of boxing unit how difficult it is. So he was trying now also to convince me that the chances have been reduced all but I don't think it's true because now like for Europe where we are qualifying one person in Africa in Europe it's four. So you see for Europe it's gold, silver and two bronze medals are qualifying in most of the way it's where... Africa is just taking out gold medals. So you find Europe and America's for Asia they have an edge because they'll be having more. Probably what will happen is that this Pari Olympic Games we are going to have the least number of Africans if what we have seen so far is anything to go by considering last time round we were qualifying gold, silver and bronze. 3 people per box. Now it has changed, with only one I think numbers are going to be much fewer. Even though where I think Africa is going to have a good chance is in the World Olympic Qualifier 2. World Olympic Qualifier 1 is going to be tricky even though we still have a chance there because in the World Qualifier with the two World Qualifiers the first one has 49 slots the second one has 51. So it means for Africans who are going to participate in the World Olympic Qualifier 1 they'll be four medals to be won. The tricky bit about World Qualifier 1 is we suspect Russia did not participate in the European Olympic Qualifiers. So most likely they'll go to the World Olympic Qualifier 1 and they'll come with us. It's a very strong team. It's one of the top boxing nation in the world. So if Russia participates in the World Olympic Qualifier because they have not gotten any tickets so far they'll try to get those tickets in the World Olympic Qualifier 1 which will happen in the month of February from 29th to 12th March. So I'm thinking that will be a bit competitive but now going into World Qualifier 2 where the top guys from Europe top guys from America top guys from Asia are already out. So I'm thinking that is where Africa is more likely to shine because for Africa you see now it's that the top guy that has gotten a ticket so all the other guys from rank 2 up maybe to 6, 8 they are potential candidates to get those medals and that's why I think most of the Africans might get a chance. We might qualify more Africans in the World Qualifier 2 than we did during our Africa continental qualifiers. Because now for the African continental qualifiers they went also for they just won the 18 places. That makes it tough for us. Now giving us a chance through the reputages of World Qualifier 1 and 2 our chances there might be good. Yes our chances are good because like for the qualifiers that we just had we had 6 boxers in the quarterfinals even though in some of the bouts we had a question about officiating also because like for a bouts that involved Boniface Mugunde I don't understand how the referees never gave any count yet Mugunde delivered some serious head punches to the books up from Lesotho it's called Michael Arena Parkela and the referee never gave any count yet in some of the bouts we could see even a jab someone getting hit by a jab on the head and the referees are giving a count and also one of the observations that you could see is that for most boxers when you get a count it's like you have lost that round ideally that should not be the case because when you hit by a punch the referee gives you a count to give you time to recover from the effects of that punch but it doesn't mean that you have lost a round so it's easy for somebody even to be hit by a punch and you go down you call it a knock down and then you come up take the count and you see the officiating being done it's a bit different and this also I think we needed to address it because during our technical meeting we raised an issue about the judges because the judges that were doing duty for the Olympic qualifiers are all not from Africa now these guys come from different countries and those countries have different boxing culture so we have not had a time as Africans to be told what is it that these judges are going to be looking for but you understand also where the judges are coming from so that when you go to the ring you know exactly what you need to do to win about so that opportunity has not been there and I think it's something that I would recommend maybe to the boxing unit of international Olympic committee to take into consideration when they are hosting this international content of championship and they are not using the judges from that continent they see how they can have a session with the teams and explain to the teams what is it that the judges will be looking for it's easier for the coaches and the technical team to handle the boxers because you know what is it that the judges are going to be looking for and when you don't know what the judges are looking for you get so much frustrated because sometimes boxing is very dynamic we can watch one fight together and we disagree who has won it's unlike football where you see a goal has been scored so this team has scored so the team has won there was also a contention when it came to Elizabeth and Diego when she lost on points she had a very good bout and the way she lost it through that split decision was not very accurate from the judges yes those are some of the challenges that we encounter because again I said boxing is objective sometimes you think your boxaha is doing so well but when it comes to the judges they seem to be maybe scoring for one one box and not the other so sometimes we have that disagreement even in the case I'm telling you about Mugunda he ma sent a video to the guy in charge of boxing in the boxing unit telling him I don't understand how there was no count in this bout so you could see he replied to me after 2 days and he told me did the right boxer won? did the right boxer win? he asked you a question so I was telling him I'll send you the whole fight but I'm not sure if the right boxer won because I'm thinking from my observation in this one round this fight will have been stopped because the guy will have been given 3 starting counts which if that happens the fight comes one end but that didn't happen again there's also an issue which maybe the boxing unit need to look into or maybe for the future because in some of the weight categories the Olympic weights are very different to the IBA weights IBA weights for men we have 13 for women we have 12 but now for Olympics for men we have 7 even though I have been told reliably that going forward in the 2020 Olympic Games they want to increase the number of women so that we have 7 7 for men unfortunately they have reduced the weight categories for men to increase those for women so that we have gender parity which I don't think is the best way to do it but the point I wanted to tell you whereby in some of the weight categories the weight difference is so big so the weight is light weight further weight is 57 kgs light weight is 63.5 kgs so it's about 6.5 kgs then you come to they removed welta weight which was about 66 kgs for men and they also removed 75 kgs which is mid weight then they brought in light mid weight which is 71 kgs so the next weight from 71 you either go to 80 kgs which is light heavy weight and then now the guys who are in mid weight which is 75 kgs they have to decide whether to go to 71 or to go to 80 but you see now we have this person who was fighting at 71 if he is having to go to light heavy weight is fighting with guys who are much stronger because if somebody is at 80 there is a difference of about 9 kgs that's a lot and you see now when somebody has recovered in the morning you weigh in the morning and fight maybe in the afternoon or in the evening which is not conducive ideally so I think also maybe the boxing unit needs to look at the weight the weight category is different so that we don't have weight categories that have a very huge difference in terms of kilograms fighting against each other or now people having to reduce so much weight so that they fit somewhere because ideally somebody tries to go where they are strong so you see now for instance if you are this category ideally light weight locally is 60 kgs so you have to decide if you are going up to 63.5 or if you are going down to 57 so that decision mostly somebody will favor going down so you try to sacrifice yourself you reduce 3 kgs so the guys will be fighting in featherweight when it's time for fighting it will be about 63 but you see now you are reducing about 6 kgs in 2 days already which is not easy and like for the case we had for Mandi Khadija Khadija is a heavyweight champion of the world so she had to share 6 kgs to fight in mid-weight and so there is a story which is now open in the public domain where she was just taking breakfast alone for the duration of the game so that she maintains her weight and be able to fight which is not the ideal situation but it's what now she is having to go through so that she is able to represent her country and she had a different story being that last time she had qualified for Tokyo Olympic Games she got pregnant she was not able to participate so she is really fighting to try and go and win a medal for Africa and we are hopeful maybe this time because she has already got the ticket hopefully she gets a medal and Africa gets its first women medalist in the Olympics well that's a tough road but we hope the best for how we are hanging out here with Duncan Kuro as sports journalist and a media communications director finally Duncan before I let you go we have got to talk about the resumption of the local league that is also coming up how are the preparations on that one going it's so tricky for us because ideally we should have had our first leg of the league happening beginning of September but unfortunately that's the time where now we had to do the Olympic qualifier and we also had to go to Cuba so that's the time we are supposed to have studied our league and now we are trying to see how we need now to change our calendar to be able to accommodate the leg that we are supposed to have played early September again we have another problem because IBA has just announced a new tournament that is coming up it's called Nesol Mandela Cup which is happening in South Africa I think from September 9th again now it's that one is also going to disrupt our program because our boxers have to go to South Africa and at the same time when that tournament will be happening we are going to be having our electoral congress for Africa where we need to go and elect the president of Africa Boxing Confederation so there's a bit of a challenge there and I know the Boxing Executive Committee of BFA is going to sit maybe in the next 2-3 days and make a decision on what to do about the league because the international calendar is very busy that we are unable to activate the local league although I know the county leagues are going on but the national league is the one that has suffered because of the international assignments but I think we are going to have a decision maybe within the next one week where we are going to make a decision on how to go ahead with the league again now if we go for the tournament in South Africa it means October is almost spent now we are left with November so I think BFA Executive has a decision to make whether we just organize some tournaments to keep the Boxers busy or whether to see if we can do less leg than we do because normally we do 5 legs of the league we see how we can try to fit them in between the period that we have which is now November December and I don't know if we are able to do 5 legs I don't think we will be able to do a whole league within 2 months so it will be a very short period so I think a decision will be made and when that decision is made I think we will be able to do 2 legs and the world well that's where we leave it and thank you for coming here on the Dutch Lane let's go for a short kumashu break, let's enjoy some Champions League Europa League highlights when we come back we'll be discussing the final