These times brought the possibility of deeper conversations with many important boxing people. The World Boxing Association President, Gilberto Jesús Mendoza, recently re-elected to the organization, continues his talks via Instagram live to bring stories to the public. On Tuesday June 2nd, he spoke with the recently crowned WBA Interim Lightweight Champion, Miriam Gutierrez, the Spaniard known as La Reina.
The conversation between the President and the boxer was touching from beginning to end, especially for the spontaneous and natural expression of the feelings of both in these difficult times, as they say: “this quarantine issue has already reached a point that we cannot understand”, an emotion that perhaps is shared by most of humanity…
Miriam is smiling and willing. After struggling through conflicts in which she has been put on the ropes, the interim champion calmly throws that “Life often gets complicated, those situations happen. The truth is that difficult things happen to all of us, and at the same time we must overcome them. That’s the value of life”, to which she adds a difficult but necessary challenge in order to reach the top of boxing and in every area: “Being able to control your emotions inside the ring is what makes you special and different. Having all that process inside your head and your heart is the most difficult thing. At the end, I always manage to make it”.
The warrior she has become was not made out of nothing nor alone, her daughter, Zaira, was one of her power sources to rebuild her life, and so was her trainer, Joe Garcia, who became part of the family after all the unconditional support he has given his pupil Miriam because he always believed in her: “When I went back to the gym, Joe wouldn’t let me talk, he only told me that he would take care of my girl and that I should only dedicate myself to training and not talk about my problems. That helped me a lot to move forward”. She added the tenacious statement: “Boxing changed my life tremendously, as a person, in how I face things, because boxing has many similarities with my life. In the end there will always be a blow that can hurt you but you are there to get up and fight. In boxing you don’t always win, the question is how to deal with it”.
Through her statements, The Queen shows between the lines the domestic violence she suffered from the father of her first daughter, Zaira. Now she has had a partner for twelve years and enjoys a second child, Joaquín: “When the whole situation happened to me, I felt guilty because I thought I was the one to blame for what was happening, but let me tell you that the aggressor is responsible for creating this conflict because he gets into your head and makes you feel like you are the one to blame, until you end up believing it”, that is why there is a need for containment for people who are immersed in these complicated relationships. Miriam was a victim of gender-based violence at the age of 21 when she was eight months pregnant and about to give birth. She suffered a very severe facial bone injury. The Queen has been fighting against gender violence in her country, and even more since May 2019, when she was appointed councilor for women of the Partido Popular in the Torrejón City Hall outside Madrid, where she currently lives.
The concrete message is to know that you can always choose to change, to become a better person, to respect your neighbor and to respect yourself in any area of life. This is the climax of a moving interview where through boxing everything comes back together to inspire others to have a better life with all that it entails: THE OF LIFE ABOVE ALL. YOUR OWN AND THAT OF OTHERS.
On November 29th, 2019, Miriam La Reina Gutiérrez was crowned WBA Interim Lightweight Champion against Keren Batiz at the Casino Gran Madrid Torrelodones, Spain. She has a record of 13 wins with 5 knockouts. At 37, she remains undefeated and ready to go for more challenges.
Moments before the end of the conversation, where they talked about many things, including food, when she declared to be a fan of sweets, La Reina made her predictions with a technical-conditional analysis of what would happen in the fight between Katie Taylor and Amanda Serrano, two great boxers with whom Miriam would love to fight to be crowned the absolute champion. This fighter, who has remarked constancy as her greatest strength, has left the door open to the possibility of going to another division in order to reach her desired reign.
