{"id":2707,"date":"2015-03-22T17:44:29","date_gmt":"2015-03-22T17:44:29","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/166.62.41.2\/~holaamericanews\/2015\/03\/22\/dynamic-local-duo-nearly-scores-twin-national-titles\/"},"modified":"2015-03-22T17:44:29","modified_gmt":"2015-03-22T17:44:29","slug":"dynamic-local-duo-nearly-scores-twin-national-titles","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/holaamericanews.com\/es\/dynamic-local-duo-nearly-scores-twin-national-titles\/","title":{"rendered":"Dynamic local duo nearly scores twin national titles"},"content":{"rendered":"

Ramsey Vesey Jr. and Lalo Ramos began amateur boxing\u2019s tournament season last fall by hatching an inspired plan together.<\/p>\n

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Pointing to the pictures of the past local champs hanging on the walls at Moline\u2019s Alley Cat Boxing Club, the duo vowed to become the area\u2019s first stablemates to win Silver Gloves national titles in a decade.<\/span><\/p>

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That seemingly impossible dream nearly became a reality last month, though, at the 15\u00acand\u00acunder national tournament in Independence, Mo.<\/p>\n

Vesey, a 14\u00ac-year-\u00acold freshman at Rock Island High School, won the 80\u00acpound title in the 14\u00ac-15 year-old division.<\/p>\n

Ramos, a 13-\u00acyear-\u00acold eighth grader at Moline\u2019s John Deere Middle School, earned runner-\u00acup honors in the 12-\u00ac13 year\u00ac-old age bracket\u2019s 100\u00acpound class.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was fun. It was crazy,\u201d said Vesey, whose namesake father started the Rock Island Boxing Club a decade ago. \u201cWe were so close. I thought Lalo won. They took it from him.\u201d<\/p>

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Ditto for Ramos, who settled instead for a silver medal before Vesey brought home the gold.<\/p>\n

\u201cI was pretty down after the fight,\u2019\u2019 said Ramos, who works out nearly each weekday with Vesey, in a facility-\u00acand-\u00actalent sharing partnership with Alley Cat. \u201cRamsey following with a win, though, helped pick me up.\u2019\u2019<\/p>

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Vesey is the first boy in the Illinois Quad\u00acCities to win a Silver Gloves national crown since current pro Joe Perez (in 2004) and Jesse Correa Jr. (2005) won in back\u00acto\u00acback years.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat\u2019s a great feeling being in that company, especially since those guys used to train with us when we were younger,\u2019\u2019 said Vesey, who started boxing at age 5. \u201cI kept telling my coaches and everybody I ran into I was going to win. So when I finally got in the ring, I didn\u2019t want to let anybody down, especially Lalo. His (decision) had me very focused and very motivated.\u2019\u2019<\/p>

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Both local boxers took different paths to the finals.<\/p>\n

Ramos faced a full bracket of fighters, needing to win quarterfinal and semifinal bouts just to reach the championship. Vesey opened with a pair of byes, though that hardly made his journey easier..<\/p>

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\u201cI\u2019d eaten a lot of junk the week before, so when we finally got there, I was a pound or two over,\u2019\u2019 Vesey said. \u201cSo that whole weekend I was working out to drop the weight.<\/p>\n

\u201cI had to wait a couple of days before fighting, and that was tough sitting there, and not really eating. I\u2019m glad it didn\u2019t hurt me too much. I really wanted to fight right away and get the nerves out.\u2019\u2019<\/p>\n

The national tournament appearance was the third for both, with the title assuring Vesey the No. 1 national ranking until next year\u2019s Silver Gloves event, his last before entering the Golden Gloves, potentially against grown men.<\/p>\n

Ramos also moves up an age bracket, with two years left in his Silver Gloves career, after advancing in successive seasons from the quarters, to the semis now finally the finals.<\/p>\n

\u201cNow, I only have one more step left to take,\u2019\u2019 Ramos said. “It hurt, but it gives me things to work on for next year. It makes me even hungrier, even more motivated now.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe kid in the finals was waiting for me to (punch) first, and then he was counter punching me. I still thought I was more active and landing more solid blows. He was throwing one punch at a time. But now, I know I have to move more when that happens again.\u2019\u2019<\/p>\n

Now, Ramos and Vesey are preparing for the Junior Olympics in June, with the two trying to spar with each other every day despite their size differential.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt helps us both,\u2019\u2019 Ramos said. “He\u2019s smaller and quicker, so that helps me learn how to fight somebody with a lot of speed. I\u2019m bigger and have more power, so that gets him used to fighting taller guys.\u2019\u2019<\/p>\n

The duo hope their daily duels lead to pro careers someday, as well as more moments like last month when Vesey shared his success with anybody he could think of, starting with a call to his mother Angela in Texas.<\/p>\n

\u201cAll of the car rides, all of the miles we run, all of the workouts we\u2019ve shared basically year round,\u2019\u2019 Vesey said, \u201call of the sacrifices we\u2019ve made have been worth it.\u2019\u2019<\/p>\n

Photo by Luis Lara<\/strong><\/p>\n

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Ramsey Vesey Jr. and Lalo Ramos began amateur boxing\u2019s tournament season last fall by hatching an inspired plan together.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":2706,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[16],"tags":[],"translation":{"provider":"WPGlobus","version":"3.0.2","language":"es","enabled_languages":["en","es"],"languages":{"en":{"title":true,"content":true,"excerpt":false},"es":{"title":false,"content":false,"excerpt":false}}},"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/holaamericanews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2707"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/holaamericanews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/holaamericanews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/holaamericanews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/holaamericanews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2707"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/holaamericanews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2707\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/holaamericanews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2706"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/holaamericanews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2707"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/holaamericanews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2707"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/holaamericanews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2707"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}