The only reason Luke Patrick landed at Littlefield's Boxing gym last year was to try and get his young bloke 'off his arse in summer and off the Xbox', he had no genuine intention of training himself.
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Now, about 12 months on, he's in the final stages of preparation for his debut in the ring at Saturday night's Battle In The Bush at Towac Park.
"Jack's back on the Xbox and I'm still here," Patrick laughed.
"He trained for, probably, a good eight months though and I think he's a bit excited to see the fight, it might make him keen to come back and train again too.
"When I brought him up to (trainer) Dave (Littlefield) I sort of thought 'well, I'm here anyway so I may as well train too' and it's been really great.
"It's really difficult, but I gave up smoking a couple of years ago and was about 100 kilos then so I really enjoyed the fitness side of things, and the guys are all really good. There's no egos, no attitudes, everyone is really supportive and there's a good sense of camaraderie.
"You fight individually obviously, but it's very team-oriented when you're training and there's guys from all walks of life - tradies, guys in the education sector, environmental scientists, it's not as cliche as you'd think in that respect."
The 39-year-old is taking on Scott Peterson in his amateur debut, one of the plethora of bouts on the undercard for Jack Littlefield's main event stoush with kick-boxing convert David Lembo.
"I've never met Scott but we've got a lot of mutual friends who are keen to see it, apparently he's a really nice bloke so hopefully once we've finished trying to beat each other up when can have a beer together," Patrick said.
"I might have my hands full I think but I'm excited, I'm nervous too. I just hope no one judges me too harshly because I'm definitely still a novice."
There's 13 other amateur fights on the undercard and three other professional bouts outside Littlefield's in a smorgasbord of entertainment, one Patrick encouraged anyone and everyone to get behind.
"I went to my first fight night in Dubbo a couple of weeks ago and it was a great night of entertainment so I'm looking forward to Saturday night," he said.
"Hopefully it'll be a big crowd and it'll be good to see a lot of people out there. They're really great nights, so I'd encourage everyone to come out and have a look."
The Battle In The Bush 5 is set to kick-off around 5.30pm at Towac Park.
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Matt Findlay
Formerly a sports specialist, I'm based at Orange and shift between wide-spread range of subjects here and, often, across the entire Central West region of NSW as well. I have almost a decade of experience in the media and marketing industries both here in Australia and internationally, along with journalism I have experience in content strategy, brand development, and digital and social media. Along the way, I've been fortunate to win a handful of media awards and be nominated for several others too.
Formerly a sports specialist, I'm based at Orange and shift between wide-spread range of subjects here and, often, across the entire Central West region of NSW as well. I have almost a decade of experience in the media and marketing industries both here in Australia and internationally, along with journalism I have experience in content strategy, brand development, and digital and social media. Along the way, I've been fortunate to win a handful of media awards and be nominated for several others too.
