I’m writing this straight after a group sparring session…….currently I am sitting on the couch typing with one finger and giggling at Glee on TV, whilst constantly flicking over to the WWE Wrestling where Jerry Springer and a dwarf are arguing over who impregnated one of the female wrestlers………..in summary there is a 99% chance I am concussed.

Quote of the Week:

“Look we really do hope you win because you have worked really hard……..but gee, we would get a lot more mileage out of this if you get beaten” – The Clearance King

Question From Readers

Do you know who you are going to fight yet? – And I get this from everybody, everyday

Below is what I wrote in week 2 and saved as a draft

The questions I get asked most when people find out I am in training for the WCB is “do you know who you are going to fight yet?” I honestly expected to be thinking about this more than I am (truth be told I spend far more time thinking about potential fight nicknames and entrance music)………. In real life I am a constant worrier and a massive over-thinker / over analyser……….i really expected this to be on my mind kinda constantly. So far (and we are only 1 week into this thing so let’s not get too far ahead of ourselves here) I am concentrating on trying to enjoy the experience and enjoy the 12 week journey (Lakers Coach Phil Jackson would be proud…….The journey is it’s own reward), just getting as fit and prepared as I can be and treating this like my only / last fight (this is not too much of a stretch as I’m not sure there is much of a career for a 30++ year old guy who has never fought before and never even laced on a glove until last year). Focusing on the journey is easier when there are maybe 7 other guys roughly in my weight range so I couldn’t work out who I am going to fight even if I tried. Although it will no doubt add to my neurotic breakdowns as I obsess about my potential opponent around week 10 when Phil Jackson’s Zen philosophy will be well and truly out the window and I am popping valium’s like Pez.

Fast forward to today………Week 10???? That now seems very aspirational. I think it’s fair to say we entered the “Lloyd Braun – Serenity Now” Stage around Week 5 and it’s continuing full steam ahead. I now have 7 different Pez dispensers including a cool Yoda one, plus a nasty valium addiction………but on the plus side I’m brown (well I will be in a few days after rubbing aloe vera all over myself) and can see my abs………that’s a fair trade for your sanity right?

What’s been the cause you ask?

Let’s get right to the Naming of Names:

Thomas L Greer – AKA Tommy Gun

Everyone who talks to me seems to think Thomas and I face a date with destiny on April 10th. This is pretty hard to get my head around for a few reasons. Firstly, we started training together last year, have spent a lot of time together and even share a cab to training together (plus I keep quiet on his juicing). In summary we are mates and the idea of fighting your mate is tough………especially if he hasn’t burned you with popcorn. The other issue is Thomas’ “alleged” alter ego……….Tommy Gunn – Porn Star. Now I have nothing against porn stars, I spend a good portion of my waking hours watching and admiring their work………its just a little disconcerting to be potentially fighting one………especially one who probably is on the juice (but you didn’t hear that from me). Snelly Balboa was the first to raise the possibility that Thomas was in fact a famous porn star. Just between us, I have watched a lot of porn and at one stage during my 2.5 year “Home Consulting” gig I was watching porn at a faster rate than they were making it. The “Porn Shortfall Crisis” as it became known was a “contributing” factor to me going back to work at a real office job. Now to be fair I’m not watching all of these movies, but rather a series of 15 second snippets, but on the basis of mathematical probability if Thomas was a famous porn star then there is a 99.7% chance I would have run across him.

Porn star or not, Thomas is keeping me awake at night………and I know Big Brucey will love that line as he likes to think of us as a gay couple (not that there’s anything wrong with that).

The Catch up:

This entry actually started out as week 4, then week 4 slipped by, then it was going to be the Chinese New Year addition and that got away from me, so lets just call it the catch up edition (or alternatively The I have run out of creative ideas edition)………and instead of focusing on training, we will delve into all the hoopla and professional production values that make Vanda’s White Collar Boxing events the spectacular successes that they are:

• Professional Camera Crews
• Interviews
• Topless Fight Promo Photo’s
• Fight Nicknames
• Entrance Theme Songs

Filming & Interviews:

We have had a big few weeks at training, sparring has started and we have done some video work, interviews and topless photos (before I got the burn / tan……doh!). Having done some previous commercial TV work I expected my experience to help me fly through the interviews and the photo shoots…………unfortunately my interview looked and sounded similar to when I was16 and fumbling around with a bra for the first time………nervous, overexcited and it was over very quickly and for the other party it was extremely disappointing.

Actually looking back at my previous commercial experience, it consisted of a starring role in a commercial that was shot during lunch hour at Raffles Place that had me wandering around in an ill fitting suit and trying to look serene whilst performing yoga poses. Considering I had been away the previous weekend playing footy and celebrating a Wombats Asian Champs victory I arrived to the shoot with approx 2 hours sleep, injured from the weekend and in what some would call a “tired and emotional state”. Things went from bad to worse when the fitted suit didn’t fit and due to a combination of my “tired and emotional” state, injuries and very limited flexibility, I was unable to perform any of the required yoga moves. So basically the shoot took 4 times as long as budgeted and they got none of the shots they needed, although I do remember the director yelling “maybe if we get him some looser pants he will be able to get his leg up”. Somehow this actually appeared on commercial TV and somehow the cheque I received even cashed. For some reason, and I’m not sure why I never heard back from that talent agency.

Using the logic that past performance is the best predictor of future performance I am not really sure why I was confident in the first place…….or why I feel confident with bra’s……..let’s just stop talking now and god help me next week when I have to do some 1 on 1 vision.

Questions from Readers:

Is it wrong to tan up before the Weigh In event at Harrys at Dempsey Hill on March 30th? –  Clint from Vanda Boxing

Good question! In our house (currently inhabited by 4 single guys……think Entourage with me as Johnny Drama only with more clothes on the floor) this topic would fit under the umbrella heading of “Vaining Up”. Vaining Up covers all areas from tanning, body waxing, veeting, nairing, eyebrow plucking and abs and guns (please note in Kenno’s case it excludes all of the above except guns). Now to the untrained eye this may not look important in the White Collar Boxing arena, but as Wombat legend The Great White used to say “If you cant be good, then look good son” (note that he would call anybody son regardless of age but that’s not important right now). Considering you wear long shorts, singlet and head gear, how important can vaining up be you ask…………well there are those massive topless fight posters like these:

…..plus the weigh in event with thousands of topless photos floating around Facebook:

So in a nutshell, yes, its very important……….especially when you are scouring the place for midgets and hot women………….I’ll take all the help I can get thank you very much. In other news there are still seats available in my cheering section for hot women and midgets.

Having not really had my shirt off in public for 20 years I enlisted a “browning consultant”, if you are looking for him on fight night he is the orange colored gentleman in my cheering section. Now as most professionals who deal with consultants on a daily basis come to learn, these consultant interactions usually end up as an unsatisfactory experience (some might even say displeasing). The best piece of advice I received was “play with your penis in the tanning bed so it tans evenly”………Really???? So it’s no surprise that I am writing this with nasty sunburn and let’s just not discuss it any more.

Choice of entrance music:

I wanted a song that I would still be happy with in 10 years when I put the DVD on to show people (that’s assuming that I manage a win…….if I lose I will be making a concerted effort to ensure no footage from the event ever sees the cold hard light of day………You think Tiger Woods carefully manages his image……look out!!!!). I wanted a song from a band I liked, that had some kind of lyrical link to the event and spent roughly 400 hours trying to find something I was happy with. The list got narrowed down to 2 finalists “So you want to be a champion” – Grinspoon (Kenno’s suggestion) and “The Pretender” – Foo Fighters. Well I got sidetracked doing nothing over the new year long weekend and before you knew I was getting angry emails from Andy (who’s English is much easier to understand when it is in its written form) on why I hadn’t filled in my profile (which includes the entrance song).

In a bit of a panic I played them quickly for Sue (co-worker who sits beside me). She advised that she thought the line “so you want to be a champion” was pretentious and voted for The Pretender by Foo Fighters, which I duly filled in on my profile. Later that night at home, housemate Kenno asked what song I had plumped for. He was told confidently that The Pretender was chosen and Grinspoon was eliminated because the lyric was a bit too pretentious……….to which he replied “how is that worse than calling everyone pretenders like in the Foo Fighter song”……ummm…..……look nowhere did it say you had to be smart to be a boxer.

Choice of Fight Nickname

This was a no brainer as I went with Splash (technically The Splash, but if there was ever an environment to refer to yourself in the third person then boxing is it. How did The Splash come about? Well, I’m glad you asked

It was a Wombat Masters tour to Bali and I was very new to the club, some pre tour email correspondence had been whipping around the week prior about what this Clint Pemberton character should be called. I had suggested my Aussie nickname of Pembo, but that was surreptitiously shot down. A few other names (Crackers & C&^t) where floated but sage advice from Wombat veteran Willo, advised that nicknames were earned not given. Long story short, actually that’s I lie I am going to indulge myself here, not so far as to mention Kardinia Park or the empty feeling a draw leaves, but self indulgent nonetheless. It’s Friday night and the boys have indulged in more than a few beers in the airport lounge and on the plane, then a few more at the beautiful Villas we are staying at. We came to the formal part of the evening the Jumper Presentation, which is where the coach says some nice things about you and presents you with your jumper for the year. It came to my turn and Coach Loutopia was mentioning that he hoped I could do something over the course of the weekend to get a nickname and called me up to collect my jumper. I was a fair way back from the makeshift stage area of the villas and somewhat “tired and emotional” and as I walked up to get my jumper I came to a large fish pond and that had some lily pads floating on it. Now for some reason I thought these lily pads where stepping stones (hey, we have already covered that I’m not very smart) and tried to walk across them. “Splash” as I disappeared into the 4ft deep fish pond as everyone was watching me walk up to accept the jumper. The boys all thought this was hilarious and Splash was born. I never thought it would stick but even know on some group emails I get the “who is Clint Pemberton?”

Airing of Grievances:

We couldn’t go without an airing.

• Wednesday night training conflicts with American Idol viewing…………and I’m dead serious
• The email said videotaping and interviews…….NOT topless photos

• • Can I get copies of these before they go out?
  • Does anyone know how to photoshop a six pack?
  • Or photoshop a tan?

• The production throughput rate of the porn industry
• Getting punched in the face
• Lack of Chicken Tikka options at Havelock Rd gym

• • Oh Curry Garden at Turf City – I miss you

• Sunburned genitalia

• Running out of pre written blog material
• Getting up at 6.30am on Saturday morning for training and your housemates are just arriving home
• Ally Loney mistaping sparring videos (although to be fair he did cop an accidental kick in the head so this is probably a wash)
• Bergs March Burger of the month (more on this to come)
• Potential cross pollination of Work tables and Wombat tables at the April 10^th event – They’re killing independent George

• Lack of steroid / HGH testing in White Collar Boxing (I’m just saying……..)

Thomas in Jan 2010 Thomas Today

Things We’ve Learned:

• You know you are getting too vain when you walk out of my housemate’s empty room with no top on late one night (I don’t have a mirror in my room) and your other housemate wanders by and asks what you are doing. When I replied “checking myself out in the mirror” he just shrugged and nodded, seen it all before………..maybe time to back off a little (or get my own mirror)
• Don’t commit to a 12 week blog when you only have 4 weeks worth of material

It has been a massive task, with an unprecedented level of applications, for what promises to be another mega event. To be held at Suntec on the 2nd October, the team at Vanda Promotions is working to ensure that once again, we put on a night to remember.

The most important part of these events is and always has been the boxers. They are the reason people attend and they are the reason we invest three months into making them the best they can be. This team will be no different with the Coaching team eager to get started as they take the number of White Collar Boxers that Vanda Boxing Club has trained to 148 in just over 2 years.

This team sees fourteen male and two female boxers with 8 nationalities represented and an average age of 33. The team will commence training on Saturday 27th June and will train with the Vanda Boxing Club team three times a week as well as on a program for self training that will be provided.

• Chris Onyilogwu
• John Judges
• Joe Lyons
• Dave Norman
• Scott Kinnear-Nock
• John Lim
• Austin Prakesh
• Gareth James
• Ted Chen
• Ursula Pong
• Owen Monaghan
• Robbie Hoyes-Cock
• Chris Snell
• Henry Atkinson
• Sheila Thomas
• Kane Bennett
• Philip Callow
• David Sulzmann

A video crew and photographer will be with the squad throughout training, so be sure to come back for regular updates as this team gets ready for their big event.

WWCBA sanctioned boxing comes back to Hong Kong for the third time in a year with the IFS White Collar Boxing being held at the Intercontinental Hotel in Kowloon on the 5th September. This will be Vanda’s 5th event in a year that will have seen more than 3000 people witness the events that have become the most popular event in the social calendar. As always there will also be a charitable element to the proceedings with Vanda looking to add to the more than HKD $1,350,000 it has raised so far for children’s charities in the region.

The boxers, representing seven nationalities, have been selected from the 57 applicants and have begun training at a number of WWCBA training establishments in HK this week. Over the coming twelve weeks they will be looking to gain the fitness and skills to gain their licence to compete in the only official White Collar Boxing event in Hong Kong. For many this event will be their first and last. For others this will be the beginning of their White Collar Boxing career that could see them compete at any WWCBA event once they have their licence including for regional and world championships.

A month has passed since our landmark, record breaking White Collar Boxing event at Suntec Exhibition and Convention Centre in Singapore. Over 1,000 guests attended the IFS White Collar Boxing® Singapore for what was the largest White Collar Boxing event ever held in the world. It was a spectacular night kicked off by 12 piece percussion and drum band Wicked Aura Batacuda. This had the guests feet tapping and hearts beating faster as our 14 boxers for the night came out through flame throwers and pyrotechnics. The audience were then treated to a great nights boxing including stoppages in bouts 3 and 5 as every boxer gave us a great display of their newly acquired pugilistic skills.  We have had rave reviews as you can see from the quotes with the main feedback being “how will you top of that?”. Well, you won’t have long to wait to find out as we are all booked for October 2nd at Suntec and we promise you another spectacular.

IFS Singapore took place two weeks after the sell-out IFS White Collar Boxing® Hong Kong which saw six bouts contested at the InterContinental Hotel. This was our first time in this venue, having previously been at the Conrad Hotel but we could not have been happier. The layout of the room was perfect for boxing and this combined with some fantastic performances from our boxers cemented the twice yearly event into the Hong Kong social calendar. This event saw Budgie Wright, a pioneer of the sport in Asia, compete for the final time and once again in winning style which saw him add another regional WWCBA to his previous wins.

At both of these events we got the opportunity to raise funds for Children’s Surgical Centre in Cambodia and it was great pleasure that Vanda was able to donate $113,275 to this fantastic charity. Dr Jim Gollogly, the founder and Principal Surgeon at CSC was able to be present at both events and it is our intention that we continue to support his incredible work at future events this year.

What else is planned for 2009?

We have more events planned in Singapore and Hong Kong for which we are just closing the applications for participation so be quick! Bangkok in October and Melbourne in November are progressing well with applications just being accepted for anyone interested in participating.

Last week the Singapore National Boxing team were competing at the Arafura Games in Darwin Australia. Vanda Promotions and Vanda Boxing Club were pleased to finance and support this trip as we look to help develop boxing in Singapore. The team put on a great performance against international teams from Ireland, Australia, Malaysia, Thailand and Indonesia to name but a few. It was invaluable experience and made all the more enjoyable with two bronze medals coming home with us to Singapore.

Our professional boxing in the last 12 months has concentrated on the management of our boxer rosta rather than our own events. That is about to change and we will back out with the news as soon as we complete the commercial contract phase with the media and sponsors. Boxing fans in Singapore have waited a long time for credible, world class boxing but not for much longer.

We continue to develop ideas centred around sports events and we are actively working on bringing to another sport the Vanda treatment we have given to boxing. Our recipe is simple, give your everday person a world class participatory experience and they will put on a performance that will have the crowd coming to watch. Add the opportunity to raise some funds for childen’s charities and the list of where we can take this is endless. Maybe you have an idea for a sporting event that we could deliver? Email me, Ian@vandapromotions.com and I will be more than happy to have the team here see what we could develop your idea.

Keep checking back, it is a hive of activity at Vanda Promotions and we will keep you all updated here.