Welcome

Bookmark and Share

Fight Like A Girl

Alex Kelkye

Courtesy Photo

Alex Kelkye

Courtesy Photo

Don’t mess with Alex Kelkye. This chick knows how to fight like a girl … and that’s a compliment.

 

Kelkye has reclaimed her health over the last three years and is committed to becoming a model of health. The journey started about 130 pounds ago, and it has become a fight that she is not going to give up on. After tipping the scales at well over 300 pounds after the birth of her daughter, she made a very important decision – the decision to change.

 

What started with little changes to diet evolved to incorporating exercise. She had put in her time on the treadmill, elliptical and in group fitness classes, but she knew she wanted more. She wanted a challenge. She wanted an outlet for stress management.

 

What did she do? Kelkye bought a heavy bag and hung it up in her house about a year ago. “I didn’t even know what I was doing. I just knew that this is something I would love.” At the time she had no formal training with boxing. She would watch it on television and learned moves from watching YouTube videos. Even after working out in the gym, she would come home and hit the bag and all the stress came out, she said.

 

When she moved into an apartment, there was no room for the bag. Kelkye realized how much she missed the sport, so she looked into the offerings at Frederick Fight Club. The Boxing for Fitness class was the knock out punch she was looking for, and she signed up last November. “I was burnt out from just going to the gym,” she said. “I wanted more of a challenge.”

 

Kelkye joins about 8 to 10 women - from ages 19 to around 50 - four nights a week for a killer workout. There is a strong focus on conditioning and technique, she said, including lots of jumping rope. “I progressed from jumping 20 times in three minutes to 116 times in two minutes.” The women run sprints, hit the bags and get in the ring to learn technique and footwork.

 

Call it not-so-classic chick fighting. These gals got game.

 

“I feel like a tough girl, yet I still feel feminine,” Kelkye said. And fortunately for her, guys aren’t intimidated by this. She said when guys learn of her boxing, they think it’s hot.

 

“We’ve all improved our boxing skills by a mile,” Kelkye said, adding that if she could, she would consider boxing as a career. “I think I was a boxer in a past life.” Acquiring these skills has also given her greater confidence in that if she needed to defend herself in an attack, she could hold her own.

 

While boxing may not be for everyone, Kelkye said it’s worth looking into, and that an all-women class is a great, non-intimidating place to give it a shot.

weigh in

You must log in to post comments.