AIR DATE:
EPISODE: Episode 33
Mike and Cedric interview David Light, a Professional Boxer from New Zealand. He competed in the men’s heavyweight division at the 2014 Commonwealth Games in Glasgow where he won the silver medal against Canada’s Samir El-Mais.
Watch Knuckle Up’s Mike Orr and Cedric Benn, who always discuss up-and-coming young, hungry, and (usually) undefeated boxers during his live daily show at 4pm EST (9pm UK) on TalkinFight.com or YouTube.com/c/TalkinFight
#TalkinFight #KnuckleUp #PeachBoxing
#DavidLight #GreatWhiteLight #NewZealand
#Boxing
Transcribed:
[, Music ].
What up talking fight fans thanks for tuning in to today’s episode of knuckle up featuring myself, mike orr and my man, cedric ben, doing what we do best prospects from around the world.
For you to see, and today we have david, the great white light in the studio today from peach boxing, as we continue with this week’s interviews david.
Thank you very much for joining us today, man uh.
I can’t wait to chop it up and uh find out all about you and the beginning of your career yeah, but man i actually like the name.
You gave me last time the great one right hyped light that was pretty cool.
Yes, taking that one off great white light, i didn’t think of that man, that’s cool! That’S good! Okay! We’Ve we’ve been named now guys right here, it’s been done.
The great white hype light there we go.
That’S awesome, uh yeah, definitely uh! It’S been a great week.
Uh talking to the rest of your stable mates, uh, i’m excited to have you in here uh, definitely been following you for a little while and uh.
You know what i think you got some uh.
You know great great skills in the ring.
You got some heavy hands and uh.
Definitely i love watching you rip guys to the body man, wow wow.
Ah thanks man yeah that more, you know the coaches uh he’s pushing me every day, he’s like just throw that rip.
It’S a hard punch to land properly and you know oh yeah, it’s a doozy though i love it, um, honestly uh.
What age did you start boxing? How did you get into it? Uh, let’s see, i want to hear all about it.
Uh yeah.
I guess my stories go to story um, you know, i’m not.
Sorry, that’s uh! You know i come from pretty middle upper middle kind of class, um, okay, my brother sort of started boxing um when he was a fighter – and i remember just watching him on tv on one of his fights, and i didn’t even mean that someone could do that.
Like that, you could have a fight like to me.
It was always an american thing, like the other ones, you can fight, not a kiwi, and i just thought it was amazing.
There, like two people, fight right in front of a whole bunch of people that, like this scariest thing in the world, so just really and um.
I started off playing tennis.
My dad came into some money pretty early on, he untouted a business and he was.
I was homeschooled and he was paying like a grand a week for me for like 10 and uh so yeah, it’s not the poor kid coming off the street, walking into a gym finding some meaning in purpose and life type story.
It’S a.
I was a rich kid getting at me from my uh tennis lessons.
You know pretty upper class support and um hated it and i was miserable and i got worse and my coach didn’t care that he was making a grand a week off me but yeah.
I got i’m the youngest of eight kids, all my brothers and sisters.
You know they’re all pretty talented, they’re um, they ran track and they were amazing um.
They were, you know, like national level, track runner um.
My brother, my one of my other brothers, just like an amazing soccer player, two of my other brother players and um and tennis players.
Actually they all played tennis they’re.
All just thought.
You know naturally i’ll be good at it and i’ll be good at sport, and i just suck it again.
It made me horribly miserable, um and like something was wrong with me, like i was a black sheep with a family or something, but once i ensure that that didn’t happen, no matter what that i didn’t fail, it’s basically what age did you actually start boxing uh? I was um, i was like kind of in and out of the gym stuff, but i i i went fully out to play tennis and then i came back and started training um.
I had my first fight at 15 and then uh again.
I’Ve trained they’re still trying to beat that dead horse and tennis until uh steam, and then i just stuck to it after that.
What uh? How long of an amateur career did you have how many fights um any accolades yeah from um? Oh man, i was so.
I started pretty much at 16 at 22, so i was about 6 years.
I had about 70 um yeah.
You know i i 2011 last 21.
I think i that’s when i was really coming into it.
Coming becoming good.
My first nationals, i think and then um through i keep winning the nationals and then in um 2014 and i went to commonwealth games and man.
I didn’t even train properly back then like training with isaac.
Now i know what real training is, but coach should definitely like what we weren’t even trading properly man i wasn’t fit and i went to the com.
I got the silver and i lost in the final leg of witness.
Probably finally took me out.
I remember two weeks games.
We had a coach come over.
He was part of the gb team, um a british coach for years and mike and he came over and he did a training with puffed out immediately and he [ Music ].
Then i think that made the whole division a bit of like who the hell is this guy bad, like it was pretty yuck and then um, but by the time i got to the fight, canadian al-samir or something or samir else, the mayor, samir el-nice.
I was actually just watching that fight right before we came on here at the commonwealth games 2014 commonwealth games, yeah yeah he’s a good fighter, but yeah yeah yeah.
By the time i got together, i’d run out of state so uh.
I think it was close.
That was real, close yeah, it wasn’t split, it wasn’t split yeah.
He bait me like he was classy yeah, very good fighter, he’s actually he’s actually a coach of the canadian canadian uh team right now, yeah because he was all back then yeah yeah.
I didn’t.
I thought this guy’s not gon na go [ Laughter, ] yeah yeah.
What did you feel was your um, your most proudest accomplishment as a as an amateur that has to be one of them getting a silver medal at the commonwealth games? That’S a big accomplishment there.
What else would you say that was your biggest moment? Well, you know the commonwealth can suddenly like britain, australia, new zealand and then malaysia, all these cubans russians the best it’s the best in those countries right still the best in those countries, yeah yeah.
I don’t want to knock it.
It was good but like when you fight in those other tournaments and, like i knocked out a russian, you know fighting chinese.
You know fighting these big countries that you know put something.
What what did you um? What gave you? The confidence to to to make that transition to the pro level.
I never like.
I used to knock the pros hard out like from new zealand you’re, the only pros we kind of i used to give in interviews where i just say: oh, you know pros amateur boxing’s with the real boxing and up on life, i said bring that up.
That is going to be the funniest thing that i’ve heard in an interview so far, that was man great real, quick, mike real, quick with isaac.
Or did you start at isaac? Oh yeah, yeah, like i, i used to train with like when i was first amateur.
So he was like we were both boxing, he he wasn’t thinking of coaching at all, so we were training to get together and – and he used to hate me because he was a middleweight he’d be awake, but i was a young guy.
That kind of came in under his wing and then the first little new zealand.
He went actually again someone who’s pretty good and internationally recognized and um, and i just played at the nationals there yeah and then two weeks later, you know we’re in the gym.
He had all these kids who came into the gym to like check get out, and there was like an after-school program thing, so a bunch of standing around the ring and because we used to spiral all the time back then and um.
The coach introduced him as the middleweight champ of new zealand and me as the runner-up and all that stuff three seconds.
I threw a jab, he slipped inside it and i threw my right uppercut, you didn’t see it.
He slipped the chin, you got ta knock the hell out, look like down bloodshot eyes, don’t bring it up, tyler just like caught him so good and knocked him out like two weeks after being the middleweight champion, but like so but man we got ta.
We were mate, it’s well before you it’s my kit, but we um.
I do what he said.
I don’t get any leeway here.
No, no he’s he’s intense man.
I did what he said and that’s why we’re doing this whole week, [ Laughter ].
I see you’re watching little buddy canada to beat me up.
Please, sir, oh yeah i’ll be watching right now, story i’ll, be in front of you about the that transition um from the amateurs to the pros again.
What did you feel was the biggest difference, because, obviously you fight, except because you know some people, some people – think that the amateurs don’t level when it comes to their pros.
But i tell people it does matter because fighting the the highest level at the amateur level.
Just helps you prepare for when you, when you turn pro, for when your record is zero zero and it actually counts right.
Just for that experience alone.
What do you think was the biggest adjustment that you had to make from the amateurs to the pro, especially because i know um um, the coach – he doesn’t really mess with the amateur.
So how did how did that come about too? Actually, i guess he kind of told the story how you guys he’s not about amateurs at all man.
He was just like.
No, no, no, i mean, like you know the amateurs that to me, like political than the pros, have ever been like the amateurs they’re.
All about the medals and the gold medals and like every single country, it seems like the the refs and the judges are now more compromised than the used to have the bad name um for years.
You know, but it seems to be more amateurs now focus on them they’re, more televised than anymore.
You know so so, if they’re corrupted it’s supposed, where is that right amateurs? You know, especially on like national levels, you just got people who just love control of their little thing and they’ve taken over the the sport, and so many americans too, and canada and everywhere and um, and it’s just it’s actually got more freedom and you’re.
Getting fairer.
Fights in the pros now but um as far as adjustments go from amateur to prayer, i mean you know, you got three minutes yeah and you got ta win two of those rounds in the amateurs and um you just got ta come you just got ta, be Growing and like i said, i wasn’t even fit and i got a silver medal at the commonwealth game, but i was able to bring it a certain level of intensity.
I guess to the first round and then run away in the third but [ Laughter, ].
The pros you’re not gon na get away with it, and some people will have these.
Like you know some people can do that intense thing for all they need.
You only need to win two rounds, so it’s a two-round fight, really right and so so many more levels of like adjusting waiting.
You can give up the first three rounds because you know you’re gon na, take it back and um the fitness level and even use your fitness.
How you let yourself drain right now, it’s just like that’s what i found the biggest, how you use your fitness? How you use your pressure and to like drain the other person over it just isn’t a thing which i think is more pros, there’s more than they have just for that reason, what do you think is the biggest um obstacle that you faced uh to date, like In the amateurs and in the pros obstacle um well i mean you know all about winning fights, so it’s um, but you know in the amateurs i got kind of like because we had.
I don’t know if you know david nikki, but he’s like good.
You know he’s coming up the ranks and that kind of stuff, but getting a medal at the commonwealth game set me up for, like, like the country getting behind me to like kind of push me for the olympics, because, like two years, you know two years out From the olympics is when you’re preparing not on the road to like like right now, there’s so so much that goes into an event like that.
They knew that he was moving up or one way to come into heavy weights, so they were gon na wait, tried it out to see who they’re gon na back, and i just thought well that’s a mistake for both of us it’s like, but they kind of Just and i kind of think they should have kept him at his way.
Um jumping up a weight for like to go to the olympics was that it turned out to be true.
They heard me a lot because it was like a rich man.
Man like we used to spend tens of thousands of dollars around the world, and you know i thought if i got a medal at the games, then i’ll get get the funding from up in the backing to like try and make it at the olympics right.
But um you know, then, then that kind of stuff, like you can’t just like, go up a weight class.
It’S like expect to do well.
You know he did really well the last olympics and i knew he was always going to do well because he’s telling a guy, but that kind of stuff you know, there’s just so much more.
That goes into it.
So that hurt me.
You know because there was years that i given to it my parents money again but yeah [, Laughter, ] they’re, just waiting for you to make the millions, so you can pay them all back right, exactly yeah.
I know i know you just caught um any plans get in the ring again before the end of the year, because i know you had that two years off, uh yeah.
Well, i did my achilles as well yeah through the whole code, um yeah um.
So it kind of worked out with me.
The pandemic can rupture my achilles now i can use you know and people i’m going to think.
I’M ducking them and like just blaming into the pandemic, you know, which is october, 8th and uh the guy those guys he probably probably doesn’t so much come to win, but he happens to survive and he survives well so just to knock him out.
[ Laughter ] of the week, so we got our sunday show knockout of the week.
So hopefully your opponent will be on there yeah.
Hopefully the title reads: david light victimizes it.
So then we have you back on the show present you with the award and then yeah.
It sounds great right, yeah, so um, this fight um this fight from may 24th against uh trent uh brought herself.
Is this your first fight since your achilles? Since you tore your kill, oh actually, no, i fought on my ship.
Oh guys, i fought a floridian um.
Well, you know i mean a guy up that side.
Okay, okay, i was about to ziggy look good in this fight here, like it didn’t, doesn’t look like it’s here.
You’Re like like that achilles was giving you any problems.
It says well the highlights from transformers he was like um he’s the cuban descent fighter.
That’S who i thought this year, so that was my first and uh [ Laughter ].
What do you think? What do you think? The biggest lesson is that you’ve learned in boxing since uh.
Ah man, like boxing man and like anyone who says they’ve, got a different perspective on life.
You know it’s um, you know know that, like people love to say, hard work, an element of talent that goes in anyway.
We’Re like roy jones didn’t work his ass off to have that kind, but he did.
But you know a lot of it was an a and um.
You know same with, like some of the that i love to watch like james, tony and stuff.
You know he started when he was what like 21 after two three years so like um.
So i got ta know it’s not all about hard work.
I think it’s it’s about recognizing what you’re the same with tennis.
You know like like i sucked at it and no matter how much i wanted it.
I wasn’t getting um [ Music ], but you know i had a knack for boxing because as soon as i i think, a big thing that i learned was that um you got ta find what you’re, naturally great on those you got.
Ta concentrate on your strengths.
You cannot just try and imagine that, like what you want to be, it’s not always gon na work out you got ta go with.
You got ta, go what works man! Definitely so what’s what’s what’s a day in the life of training, with isaac like how, how is it let’s go here? I want to hear your version of it because i’ve heard a few versions so far.
Let’S hear how he put you in you know, i’m still i’ve like just come into like a new kind of job, my business, but you know i move around a lot because i take on different different roles being part of the family and stuff.
I had to work my ass off on friday and i just went, but my brain just blew out and i didn’t have liking and we just have.
We knew on fridays, as you usually like a bit of more of a chill day, because we did a thursday a bit of a chill a bit more skills on a friday and then like a real hard one saturday.
But now like that day, it was just just like he almost looks at you thinks like he can smell some weakness and he’s like he’s dead right now and you’re like oh man.
I was just on the back.
Couldn’T my brain.
It was more my brain than my body even like i just couldn’t push, and then he was he was assuming man.
It was like.
You can’t have one off day, man, it was sniff that way for it.
Sending me take so afterwards, like you heard me without the [ __ ] you were today is like man like you got to be on your toes.
You got to be ready to give it all like he wants to put you in um because, like so much of it is mean to delay.
Even your fitness like it’s like.
Can you push yeah? Can you push when the time gets tough? Then you know we call that you’re, tough and you’re hard, because you’ve been training that way, so he you know picked, but you know he doesn’t it’s not like just crazy fitness.
You know like it’s um, we do heaps of skill stuff.
I think that’s why we’ve come out of the pandemic all during he doesn’t leave any stone unturned, man and like he thinks he thinks that he’s going to put you through he’s not just like rocking up there, and it’s like that, was it on the spot.
He’S he’s thinking about your training, who you’re fighting he’s called people he’s all.
That’S always thinking about what how you’ve been training, what you need, um! You need that kind of level.
It’S you.
You can be a talented coach, but if you don’t, if you’re not investing the gym when you’re fighting because they’re not going to go anywhere and he’s definitely so down here man, he he’s he’s actually devoted his life to us.
That’S boxing word: every action that he has is calculated right.
So, like he’s, got pretty much a calculated plan for each and every one of you and yeah.
That’S yeah.
He doesn’t like you to know his calculations.
He does he’s up [ Music ], you know he’s.
He comes across as like this trash like he was all over himself like huskies voice, like people just think that he he’s some sort of dude.
He just got out of prison and got into boxing because he’s um he’s on a whole nother level to people usually and when it comes to um thing and planning and looking ahead i mean that guy’s always thinking about his he’s on box rick.
So much that his boxing he has to use my box rick and stuff because he’s constantly looking like this is my box right.
They stopped letting me follow people, because i was following over 300 prospects: yeah yeah yeah.
You can only follow 10, i’m like what the [ __ ] is.
This [ __ ] like i didn’t even know that there were roses like that on box tricks now, but i’ve been doing this for so long.
I follow so many of you up and comers man from [ Laughter, ] um.
I forget what it was now just about um training in general.
What’S the most amount of rounds that you fought as a pro so far, i’ve done only 10 rounds so far um and about 14 points.
Yeah.
14.
.
Interesting now you said 14 rounds yeah.
I know i know i know um.
How did you feel like uh? How was that training camp different training for like 10 rounds, as opposed to like four and six, and you know when you’re working your way up, especially when you’re coming from the amateurs, as when you’re just doing three? As you said, you just have to prepare for two rounds.
You just got ta win two out of the three rounds of the amateur as opposed to six out of the ten.
You know as a pro.
How was that? How was how? How did you make that change in training like what did you make or did you get like? Did you just run longer miles or obviously, more sparring? How was that yeah? I just felt what a man [ Laughter ], what happened? What did you do and it’s like man, there’s no secret formula, it’s just getting in the gym.
That’S what to be fair, like i did start to think man like because my times in the year just to get to that 10-0 record.
So i could start fighting for real titles and the bombs and like it didn’t even matter if i had to fight them.
Ten rounds not and i didn’t – have to be fit, but rounder was for a orient to a title against a guy who fought for the world title twice and my first real real fight and um.
You know i had to get that was playing again right.
Yeah yeah going against going to nutritionist.
That was like one of the like um monitoring.
What i’m eating and seeing how much like the eating, how it makes you even just how it makes changes your mood and how it affects your sleep and regulates all your stuff and then just giving me the energy to like get get through the rounds like.
If i don’t know how, if i would have gone but – and that was just one little thing of like meeting a nutritionist – you know you know every other week, so it’s um yeah.
Just all that that’s obvious to me now it should be obviously anyone listening at that point like i had only been a pro like a year and uh.
I had taken it two years after the commonwealth game, so yeah that was just a nice nice.
Nice nutrition is all about it.
Man, a lot of people, don’t understand how much nutrition helps with your stamina and your muscle strength and everything.
It’S it’s such a heart attack yeah, you know, yeah yeah mean things outside the extent that we’re like that put me to the next level, and i thank you for anyone that maybe is thinking how do they not doing that, like regulating your sleep, regulating what you’re Eating regulating all the you can’t just think about boxing when you’re in the gym.
If that’s, what how you doing you’re not gon na go very far i’ll just be saying as a heavyweight um, you don’t necessarily have a have a weight limit suppose, but you still have to obviously have to watch what you’re eating to make sure you’re.
Still, your body still good to have that stamina.
The rest 10 rounds right, yeah yeah.
Well, i mean like i was still fighting cruise away.
Okay, that was the big thing of like down to the weight while, like maintaining my energy – and you know, i thought it was going to be – you know – got to eat less and take things, but when i got there, she was like yo you’re, not you’re way, Not eating enough and i’m like how is it six kgs over my weight, it was just like what you’re eating how you’re eating and then my whole oh my way lighter and i felt way more empathetic.
So it’s just such a huge thing.
What’S up? What’S? What’S the say, where do you see yourself in say the next year to two um man like i was you know like you know, even inside the ring and stand in front of your opponent, you got ta, be willing to fight and um.
You don’t back off because you’re gon na get trained and you’re backing up.
If you stand in front of them and you you impose your will and i think that’s kind of with fighting like isaac, always because he wants us to fight and um.
I want to fight a career that spans like 10 years and like i’ve, only fought like every now and then to like take that one step forward like i want to be a world champion in a next year too.
That’S my goal.
You know: that’s that’s what it’s all about! That’S why we still do this uh yeah.
You know the pandemic’s been crap but like, like we were saying before everyone likes to use it pandemic and now that everyone knows all the events of every little thing that happens around the world.
They can come up with it.
It’S um, you know it’s, we don’t.
We don’t want excuses, i don’t want to use a pen, i just want to fight and uh be reading it.
So you’re cur you’re, currently the what the wbo international cruiser the oriental cruiser and the new zealand uh cruiser correct.
I think they stripped me of oriental cruiser and i don’t think i’m well jerome took that one yeah now he’s now like a high-rated cruiser than me for like one fight but yeah, i am the international cruiser.
I know i’m the current international, no cruiser.
No! That’S great man, oh um, cedric, well we’re going to get out of here soon.
You want to ask any more questions.
Um, no any any uh same questions.
I usually ask all of our guests.
Any any training plans um planning on coming to canada soon for any of your training cams.
If you are you’re more than welcome, i got my gym here.
You can usually i do the interviews where you can see the gym in the back, but it’s everyone’s gym.
Full of people now i’ve seen it yeah, okay, [ Laughter, ].
Another question: i always ask everybody this: do you want to be loved? You want to be feared in the ring um.
You know.
I want to be yeah the crowd, like that’s what it’s all about right now, [ Laughter, ], all right david, we’re not going to keep too much longer man.
I know it’s early in the morning and you probably got running or something to do.
Uh.
Thank you for the time to come and join us today.
Man, it’s been a pleasure.
Thank you.
We’Ll definitely be you in the future.
Um i’ll.
Have you back anytime uh.
You know we’ll keep in touch we’re.
You know we’re we’re fans for life now so yeah.
We’Re definitely gon na be watching you uh progress and, and definitely we think that uh we’re gon na see.
You know world championship belt on you very soon that because uh yeah i’ll, let you down, don’t worry, you won’t you.
Will you won’t? Let us down man the great white hype light remember.
Well, i’m adopting that man, i i i well taco fight fans thanks for tuning in to today’s episode of knuckle up with myself and cedric ben and our special guest david, the great white hype light.
You know what it is: man, it’s new tomorrow, same time, same channel female friday, we’re going to be talking to mia and aaron walsh.
We got them both here tomorrow to join us for the continuation of peach boxing week.
You know what it is man, it’s your man.
My car, we’ll see you tomorrow.
There are no reviews yet.