After his much-anticipated maiden professional fight was delayed due to unforeseen circumstances, Tommy Petchell is gearing up to make himself known to the boxing world when he makes his debut in September.
The 20-year-old, who trains at Cambridge Fight Centre, was due to step into the ring on Saturday (29 June) to face Steph Vincent in a welterweight clash at York Hall, in London.
But the bout has been rearranged for the same venue on Saturday, 28 September, with Petchell’s opponent not yet confirmed.
His father, Tony Petchell, is a coach for England Boxing – where he has worked for the past six years – and also makes up part of his son’s coaching team.
“I’m very proud. He’s only young, but he’d done a lot already,” said Tony, who is the co-owner of Cambridge Fight Centre.
“There hasn’t been a professional boxer in Cambridge for years. Tommy wants to chase titles, and we’re pretty confident we’re going to get some.
“We said to him ‘you're getting one debut, one professional debut’. He’s had a very good amateur career, so everybody’s going to be looking at him.
“The fight will be streamed live, on DAZN or one of the big television channels, so (his dad said to him) ‘everybody will be watching, you’ve got to give the best account of yourself’.”
Before boxing, Petchell was crowned 65cc motocross champion when he was just 12 years old, but started to follow in his father’s footsteps a year later.
The former Cambridge Regional College student enjoyed a stellar amateur boxing career, which included more than 30 bouts, two Eastern Counties Championship finals and a silver medal at the Riviera Box Cup last year.
He then signed his first professional contract with Lee Eaton and Let's Go Management in April.
“He said to me one day ‘I just want to start boxing’. I just let it go over the top of my head but he kept going on, and on and on,” said Tony.
“He started, won his first few fights and he was just naturally good at it, so he concentrated on boxing.
“He trained up as a personal trainer just so he could be in the gym all the time. In any of his spare hours, he just trains.
“When you’re a child, I think you run on talent. But when you start getting your strength, when you’re about 18, then it boils down to your training as well.
“You can’t just rely on talent, you’ve got to be very fit and very dedicated - which he is.”
When he received the news that the fight had been pushed back, Petchell was ‘gutted’ and ‘devastated’.
Petchell has now removed the disappointment from his mind though and is getting preparations back under way for his debut.
Already training two or three times a day, from the end of July Petchell will embark on an eight-week fight camp – which his father described as a ‘military mission’.
Every day will be mapped out to the nth degree to help Petchell follow an intense and strict training and food plan.
“He’s relaxing now and then in the last week of July he’ll step it up,” said Tony.
“You’ve got to spar three, four times every week. It’s really intense. Then on the last week you take it down, no sparring, so your body recovers and you can have that optimum strength.”
Some 100 tickets had been sold for the bout in the capital and Petchell confirmed all of them will immediately transfer over to the new date.
On a Facebook post, he added: “I guarantee it will be worth the wait and I promise fireworks.”
