The crowd of more than 250 packed into the basement of Mississauga's HUF gym roared as amateur boxer Bruno Sylvestri, last night’s main event attraction, launched a clobbering overhand right to the temple of Waseem El-Sinawi of Windsor. Rocked back into the ropes, El-Sinawi was given an eight-count.
Sylvestri, a welterweight (151 pounds), fearlessly stalked El-Sinawi despite an obvious height and reach disadvantage, and slammed him with two more looping right hands, earning another eight-count. The referee had seen enough, and awarded the TKO win to the HUF boxer in the third round.
Fans of Italian boxers can’t miss the inspiration for the St. Francis Xavier Secondary School student’s crouching, aggressive style. Sylvestri, 17, and a “full-blooded” Italian, has eagerly studied tapes of legends such as Jake LaMotta, Carmen Basillio and Rocky Marciano.
“The Italian fighters are great, and have a lot of heart,” said Sylvestri, who has been boxing for two years. “When I was sparring, I’d think of those guys.”
But Marciano wasn’t the only Rocky to inspire Sylvestri. The movie version was the catalyst for the young boxer’s career.
“My dad said, ‘sit down and watch this,’” recalled Sylvestri of his first exposure to Stallone’s famous character. “I watched ‘em all - a marathon through the whole day. That really inspired me. From then on, it was like, ‘that’s my life right there.’”
Sylvestri’s aunt brought him to HUF for a class around that time, and after years of playing hockey on such teams as Port Credit Storm and Erindale Spitfires, he decided it was time to return to the gym and dedicate himself to boxing.
“I came in, and I loved it,” he said. “Andrew and Olga (Heron) are great coaches.”
Now 8-2 and in the Open division, Sylvestri is looking forward to the Provincials in October. His assistant coach, Roberto Bruno, thinks Sylvestri’s performance Tuesday, in which he scored his first KO since early in his career, showed the potential the young boxer possesses.
“He got a lot of attention today,” said Bruno. “He was the headliner, and a lot of people when it comes to attention, they do either two things: they fold or they thrive. And he’s the perfect example of thriving.”
Other Mississauga boxers on the card included:
* HUF’s Jonathan Rego, who lost a decision to Steve Franjic of Bigtyme
* Cathy Vaningen of Dewith’s Boxing Studio, who lost to Renelle Minott of Toronto Newsgirls
* heavy-hitting Yanni Tome of All Canadian Martial Arts, who thrilled the crowd by stopping Bigtyme’s Paulo Dukic
* local heavyweight sensation Denton Daley of Dewith's, who continued his KO streak with a
first-round stoppage of Don Willis of Windsor
* Marco Culmone of HUF, who won a split decision over Travis Ridell of Bigtyme in his amateur debut
* Amanda Galle of All Canadian, who won a split decision over Kira Lococo of Newsgirls in one of the best battles of the night.