The Hoot sat down with Haile Pereira ’27, the President of the Brandeis Boxing Club, to learn about what his club offers, what new members can expect at practice and what the rest of the year holds for the club. The club is “committed to providing a supportive and inclusive environment that fosters personal growth, enhances physical fitness, and cultivates a passion for the sport of boxing,” and they’re proud to offer a “team of experienced boxing coaches [that] is dedicated to helping you reach your full potential.”
Pereira described a typical week for the Boxing Club, saying that they meet Mondays and Wednesdays from 5 p.m. to 6 p.m., and on Saturdays from 2 p.m. to 3:30 p.m. He noted that the club has “a big emphasis on teaching people boxing, but we also have a wide variety of people in our club. [Including] beginners [and] more experienced people.” He added that the group has “a coach that comes in and she teaches our classes on Mondays and Saturdays. Wednesdays [are] our student Training Captain-led practice, where we have more of an open-gym style practice this semester.”
Pereira also told The Hoot that, “likely starting this October, we’re gonna be heading back to the Nonantum Boxing Club [In Newton] that we went to last year. Sure. So we train out there for our more intermediate practices on Saturday. We have people who train for matches against those guys and people in the area.” He added that Nonantum has “a variety of people there too. They have people who are beginners, they also have people who are professionals there too. Our Saturday practice is for people who are looking to up their game.”
Pereira also noted that the Boxing Club works to “coordinate events with other martial arts clubs, like an event with the “Mixed Martial Arts [MMA] Club,” also run by him, where they hosted a watch party for UFC 306, a professional MMA organization’s recent event.
For a new member coming to their first practice with the club, Pereira recommends coming Monday or Saturday, when their coach is present. “She makes it really easy for beginners, [and] usually we have a fair mix of beginners and more advanced people,” he added. He noted that students can “come into the club at any point throughout the semester and [get] the same level of training. Nobody’s really getting left behind.
He told The Hoot that he doesn’t want students to be intimidated by the violence of the sport that can be seen on TV. He said that his favorite aspect of boxing is “the training. … It’s nice to see people grow and learn how to do the moves.” In closing, he said that boxing is “more of a discipline than anything else. So, it’s about the repetition and coming in and just getting better.”
