THE RISE OF AN OLYMPIAN
Glendale News Press
09/09/28/sports/gnp-spvanespart1092809.txt
Glenda le resident Vanes Martirosyan is an undefeated
welterweight.(Roger Wilson/News-Press) After learning sport of boxing
as a child, fine amateur career led to Olympics.
By Gabriel Rizk Published: Last Updated Sunday, September 27,
2009 10:12 PM PDT This is the first of a three-part feature story
on the life and career of undefeated Glendale boxing phenom Vanes
"The Nightmare" Martirosyan. It will run in consecutive installments.
Before the "Nightmare," there was just a dream.
The fame, honor and respect that Vanes Martirosyan has garnered as an
amateur prodigy, a teenage Olympian and a professional boxing prospect,
and the ultimate glory the fast-rising undefeated welterweight hopes
to yet capture as a world title holder — it all started as a gleam
in the eye of his father Norik Martirosyan.
And before the dream was Vanes’ to realize, it belonged to Norik.
Vanes "The Nightmare" Martirosyan, now 23 years old with a record
of 25-0 and presumably on the threshold of an imminent title fight,
has only distant memories of Abovyan, Armenia, where he was born and
lived until age 4, at which time he moved to the Glendale area with his
grandparents, father and mother Zhenik and his three siblings in 1991.
But it’s in the family’s homeland that this story begins.
As an 18-year old soldier in the Armenian army, Norik first learned
to box. It was there that he fell in love with the sport and came
home with modest aspirations of developing a life of his own in boxing.
His own father had different ideas.
"My grandpa didn’t let him fight, it was tough over there and he had
to work," Vanes says. "He wanted him to get a job and thought there
was no future in boxing over there.
"But [Norik] loved it, he’s always loved it."
The move to the United States, which occurred after Norik lost his
right hand in a grenade explosion while serving in the Nagorno-Karabakh
War against Azerbaijan, brought with it opportunities for Vanes and
his siblings t to enjoy a pastime, or even pursue a career, in boxing.
A rambunctious kid with tireless energy, Vanes frequently found himself
getting in tussles in the neighborhood around his family’s new home.
"I was always getting into fights at Maple Park," he recalls. "Not big
fights or anything, but when older guys would stand in front of me,
I would not back down, like bullies and stuff. I was little, but I
held my own."
In response, Norik found a local gym in Glendale where Vanes could
channel his vigor into learning to box and Norik could take all three
of his sons to train in his spare time.
"Every now and then, you could feel that he still had that feeling
inside him that my parents wouldn’t let him box and he believed in
himself that he would have been somebody special in boxing," Vanes’
uncle, Serg Martirosyan, says of his brother, Norik. "But there’s
always a border. Sometimes, [parents] want their kids to do what
they couldn’t do, but it’s not like [Norik] was forcing him. When
the coaches saw [Vanes’] talent, they told him, ‘Do whatever you can
to keep this kid having fun in boxing and stay in it and the time
will come.’"
That message was taken to heart. Vanes’ older brother, Vahe, eventually
discarded boxing in favor of swimming, while the younger Vatche took up
soccer. Vanes himself later wanted to quit boxing to play basketball,
but, sticking to the advice of Vanes’ coaches and his own motto of,
‘Once you start something you finish it,’ Norik never let Vanes stray
too far from the ring.
"He pushed me there and I started loving the sport," Vanes says.
Norik often left the technical training to Vanes’ coaches, content
to offer pointers and strategic advice where he saw fit. Rather, his
domain was overseeing the physical training and mental dedication
needed to forge a fighter — the rising at dawn, the running, the
hours in the gym — and stoking the internal fire that fuels the
effort. He made sure young Vanes’ motivation never lagged.
Trainers, coach d business associates have come and gone over the
years, but Vanes has always kept his father closest. Versed in the
European style of boxing favored in Armenia and an avid student of
American boxing since emigrating, Norik is a wellspring of knowledge,
which his son consults daily.
"To this day, my dad still teaches me things," says Vanes, whose
next fight will reportedly be for the World Boxing Organization
Intercontinental title on Dec. 19 in Cancun, Mexico. "He knows a
lot about boxing. He can see a weakness in an opponent. Whoever I’m
fighting, he just looks at them on the scale and whispers something
to me.
"To this day, he wakes up with me in the morning at 5 a.m. and we go
running, he’s there all the way with me. He’s never missed a fight."
Once his first teacher, now his most trusted advisor, Norik remains,
as always, a steadying and comforting presence for Vanes.
"I’ve always loved boxing," Norik says through Vanes’
translation. "It’s been my dream and now I want to accomplish both
of our dreams at the same time."
Vanes is known for a dedication to training that he says grew out of
simply loving to be in the gym as a kid and looking up to the older
men there. Early on, he was most often the youngest.
"We had an 8- or 9-year old requirement to be a member, but I remember
he and his dad were so persistent, I waived that age requirement so
he could join," says retired Glendale Police Officer Ron Williams,
who operated the Police Athletic League youth boxing program, of
which Martirosyan was a member from age 7 to 14. "From the beginning
he had a great work ethic, but he was a little troubled in school. He
was a kid with a lot of energy and I think his focus was not directed."
On more than one occasion, Williams suspended Martirosyan from boxing
for academic issues, but each time he would work his way back in and
his dedication to the boxing program, which provided semi-professional
instruction and was affiliated with the Amateur Boxing Assn. and local
and nation ed in Montrose and he would ride his bike from Montrose and
back after training every day," Williams says. "He was an exceptional
athlete. …He was focused, even at a young age, to do the training
and the road work and heavy bag work. All the boring things about
the sport, he was there in the hopes to succeed."
Williams says that Martirosyan was sparring by about 8 and before he
left the club was holding his own in sparring sessions with men much
older and bigger.
What Martirosyan recalls as his first real amateur fight occurred
when he was 12 in a gym at Villa Park in Pasadena.
"They didn’t have an opponent for me and I started crying because
there was nobody for me to fight," Vanes says.
Norik scrambled to find an opponent at the gym, coming back with a
kid a couple years older and about 10 pounds heavier. Not long after,
Martirosyan had won his first ever boxing match.
Martirosyan went 120-10 as an amateur, but a good share of the
obstacles he overcame during those years were outside the ring, as
sacrifices were necessary to support a budding career that required
him and Norik to travel to competitions and tournaments.
"They had tough and good days with boxing, especially in the amateur
years," Serg says. "When the family emigrated here from Armenia,
financially, they were in a bad situation. Traveling, expenses, going
to hotels when he was 12 or 13 years old … they didn’t have money
even to rent a hotel. [Vanes and Norik] just stayed in a car until
the morning when [the fights] started.
"But, finally they came through to where Vanes is right now and
that brought them together more because of the things that they went
through together."
Only 17 years old and a proven talent in the amateur ranks, Martirosyan
began to turn his attention toward a run at the Olympics early in 2004.
His first shot at an invite to the Olympic trials was at the
U.S. Championships in Colorado Springs, Colo., where his bid was
derailed by a loss resulting from a low blow against Rudy Cisneros
that he s to this day.
"That was the politics of USA boxing," Vanes says. "[Cisneros] was
[U.S. assistant Olympic Coach] Al Mitchell’s [guy].
"He went on to the finals and he lost to Austin Trout, who I beat
twice."
To keep his Olympic dream alive, Martirosyan had one option — return
home for the Western Olympic trials and win five fights in five days
to qualify for the Olympic trials.
As he tells it, the long-term plan entering the 2004 Western trials
was to make the U.S. team for the 2008 Beijing games with little real
expectation of actually making it to Athens.
But Martirosyan got a fortuitous break in a bizarre turn of events
involving the two fighters considered the favorites to qualify for
the U.S., Andre Berto and Juan McPherson.
In a head-to-head bout early in the trials, Berto injured McPherson
with a flagrant foul that rendered McPherson unable to return to
the trials. A dispute over that ruling led to Berto eventually being
disqualified, as well, and he later ended up competing for Haiti.
"[Norik] just said to enjoy it, get some experience, fight these guys
and see how you feel," Martirosyan says. "I started beating these
ranked guys, not only beating them, but I was knocking some of them
out. Little by little, I got the confidence."
It was at the Western trials that Martirosyan got the nickname he
still sports, during a win over Timothy Bradley.
"I knocked him down in the first round and I had him out in the last
round," Martirosyan said. "I almost knocked him out and that’s where
I got the name ‘Nightmare.’ The crowd started yelling my name saying,
‘Nightmare.’"
Martirosyan made it through to the Americas qualifier in Tijuana,
where he defeated local favorite Pedro Monsivais on March 18 in front
of a hostile crowd before dominating Tureano Johnson of the Bahamas
in a third-round technical knockout in the quarterfinals and edging
Canadian Adam Trumpish in the semifinals.
"I don’t know if it has hit me yet," Martirosyan told the News-Press
following the sh, which guaranteed him a spot on the Olympic team by
virtue of reaching the final round. "It was kind of a dream."
The Olympics were already secured, but Martirosyan had some unfinished
business with his finals opponent, Berto, who had handed him his only
loss in the Western trials, which was later vacated.
"My hand was swollen and I couldn’t fight, but I told everybody,
I’m gonna fight," Martirosyan says. "I have to prove to everybody
that I deserve to be on the team."
Martirosyan came out victorious, 25-21, in a four-round decision behind
a strong fourth-round rally and claimed the gold medal for the trials
in the welterweight division, but that was far from the only windfall
that came about as a result of Martirosyan’s surprising run through
the qualifier.
Among those in attendance was preeminent boxing manager Shelly Finkel,
who was already aware of Martirosyan, but was ultimately swayed by
his compelling win over Berto.
"I saw him at several other tournaments before the trials and I said,
‘This kid is special, he has all of this ability,’" recalls Finkel, who
has represented former world champions Mike Tyson, Evander Holyfield
and Pernell Whitaker, among many others. "He showed a lot of guts in
the Berto fight, I remember, where he was hurt and he came back. It
was really special. I thought I’d like to work with this kid."
When Martirosyan went on to Athens, Norik, Serg, Vatche and his cousin
Eiloush all enjoyed a ringside view of his fights, courtesy of Finkel.
"We hadn’t even signed anything with him yet," Vanes says, "but he
would do nice things because he liked the way I boxed."
On Aug. 15, Martirosyan won his Olympic debut, easily beating Algerian
Benamar Beskine, 45-20. A tougher challenge awaited four days later
in the Round of 16 against Cuban Lorenzo Aragon, who was a favorite
to win the gold.
Aragon jumped out to a 14-4 lead over the first two rounds before
Martirosyan won the third, 4-3, and fought to a draw in the fourth
and final round.
"We e Olympic test event and he adapted his style from that meeting,"
Martirosyan told the Associated Press following the 20-11 loss. "He
holds you, pulls you back and makes it look like you’re holding,
and you’re not. It frustrates you. I thought I scored more points,
and I thought I should have won."
Says Finkel: "[Vanes] was still just beginning, he was young with
a lot of energy. He was just coming into his own and it might have
been a little bit too early for him [to medal]."
Following the 2004 Olympics, Martirosyan had a decision to make.
Fresh off an Olympic debut that showed promise for a 2008 medal run,
he could remain an amateur and continue training for what his father
held as the ultimate achievement — bringing a gold medal back for
the U.S. Or, with a power player manager waiting in the wings to
sign him and begin opening doors, he could turn professional ahead of
schedule and begin the arduous pursuit of a different kind of glory,
the world title …