2 veteran amateur boxers have gone toe to toe some 62 years after their first encounter – and it’s all thanks to a chance meeting in a Wellow bus shelter.
In 1962, 18-year-old George East travelled with his Portsmouth Amateur Boxing Association club to the Isle of Wight for a meeting with the Newport Boxing Club. After a brisk battle, George lost on points to 22-year-old John Toogood.
After many years living in France, George and his wife Donella relocated to Freshwater 5 years ago, and a recent Sunday morning trip to the village of Wellow led to a remarkable ‘re-match’.
George explains:
“We’d dropped into the bus shelter ‘library’ for a book-swap and met Bazz Sowerby, a born and bred Islander. During the conversation, I mentioned I had visited the Island for a boxing bout many years before, and that my opponent had the unusual name of Toogood. I also said I remembered his name as he had been too good for me that evening!
“To my amazement, Bazz said his close friend was John Toogood, who was a former keen boxer and president of the Newport Boxing Club. When we enquired, it turned out that John was indeed my long-ago opponent!”.
The couple recently met up at John’s home in Newport to reminisce about their first bruising encounter and talk about a possible re-match-in the local pub.
After a varied career including work as a radio presenter, bouncer and private detective, George East is the author of more than 30 travel books, memoirs and novels.
John served in the Merchant Navy in his younger days, but spent most of his working life on the Island as a civil engineer. He started boxing as a welterweight in 1957, when the Newport Boxing Club met in a Nissen hut at the bottom of Hunnyhill. The club was rebuilt in the 1990s to plans drawn up by John after fire destroyed the old building. Opened in 1998, the old club was renamed – for obvious reasons – the Phoenix Boxing Club.
