Salinas >> Closter Park is packed most afternoons with people playing basketball, soccer or just running around on the playground.
And in the corner of the park near Beach Street and Dewey Avenue sits the Salinas Boxing Club, which is also filled with bodies in motion — about 20 kids learning the “sweet science.”
Jose Picazo has been going to the Salinas Boxing Club for more than two years and working his way toward the Junior Olympic Championships in May.
The 12-year old boxing prodigy used to play basketball but said he thought it wasn’t as intense as stepping inside the ring.
“I wanted to try boxing because I heard it’s a good sport, a good workout for you and basically also I heard that by competing you have a better chance of becoming successful, so why not try it?” Picazo said.
Picazo said his grandfather used to be a boxer in Mexico. Like any good grandparent, he gave Picazo some good tips about what to do and what to avoid inside the ring.
Picazo said he believes joining the club has made him a better person because it has helped control his anger.
“I don’t burst out all of a sudden and start beating up someone,” he said. “Plus, it’s made me a better person because I’m confident now because before I was never confident, I’d keep my head down. But now I’m confident enough to speak to someone, I don’t feel embarrassed.”
He is just one of the kids that Robert Medrano, who runs and coaches the kids at the Salinas Boxing Club, has helped over the years.
And not just any kid can be in the club. The kids have to be enrolled in school and have to keep their grades up, especially if they want to compete in Golden Gloves or any other tournaments as Picazo has.
Medrano said he and the some of the other coaches make sure the kids are up to date with their homework by checking in with them on a regular basis. And if the kids are lagging there’s a tutor center in the building that will help them catch up.
“Nowadays you need to have a high school diploma, you need that education,” Medrano said. “That’s why I tell them it’s very important that they get it.”
Medrano said he loves being a mentor and talking to the kids. Plus, he’s a huge advocate of education and makes sure the kids stay in school.
Medrano dropped out of high school at the age of 15 and went on to work in the agriculture industry with strawberries and celery, which was followed by a construction job. But, he went back to Hartnell to study psychology and graduated with a degree.
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“I tell them you always need to get something to fall back on, you got your education,” he said.
Coach Robert
Medrano, also simply known as Coach Robert, said some kids who walk into the gym might be involved with gangs, sometimes bullied or just a shy person.
“But once they start training and boxing they become more open, more talkative and communicate with people easier,” Medrano said.
Medrano, 52, grew up and still lives in Watsonville. Boxing has been in his blood since he put on his first pair of gloves at the age of 9.
Medrano continued boxing when he trained with William “Tex” West, who owned and ran the Tex West Boxing Club in Prunedale. West was a former professional boxer who founded the Prunedale Boxing Club in 1964 and later changed it to the Tex West Boxing Club.
But then Medrano went to the Police Activities League center in his hometown and anywhere else he could find to workout.
“And then other people that had their gyms like in the garage or barns, we’d go train over there,” Medrano said.
Medrano never fought pro but did find himself in some amateur fights. After he stopped fighting, he ended up at the Salinas Boxing Club after he was looking for a spot to train his son, Jose Roberto Medrano Jr.
That was in 2012 and Daniel Lujan Sr., who Medrano had worked with before, was in charge of the club. But in 2013 the longtime Salinas boxing coach was sentenced to six years in prison after he admitted to molesting a 14-year-old girl who trained for several years with him.
Medrano took over and helped keep the club afloat in hard times. It took awhile for the gym to regain the respect and notoriety it once held when it was producing champions. Medrano said he would go to tournaments with his wife and overhear people talking about them as if it was them who committed the crime.
Medrano said some people even suggested he should change the name of the gym. He refused.
“We didn’t do that, it wasn’t us,” he said. “It’s unfortunate what happened with them. But the kids, why do they have to pay for it?”
Boxers under Medrano’s tutelage have been successful, winning several tournament and age-group championships. This year he has some nationally-ranked kids.
Picazo, who is ranked No. 1 in the country in his age group, has five tournament championships, including the California State Golden Gloves. . Maria Jardines, 14, is ranked No. 1 for her age group and has six tournament titles, including the California Golden Gloves, while Iris Rivera, 17, is ranked No. 2 and has four championships.
Jardines also won a silver medal at last year’s Junior Olympics and got first place in this year’s qualifiers in New Mexico. Next up for all three of them is the Region 11 Junior Olympic Championships in Fresno on May 5. The winners move on to the 2018 Junior Olympic, Youth Open and Prep National Championships in Charleston, West Virginia.
Dynamic duo
Jardines joined the Salinas Boxing Club three years ago. She said she never pictured herself fighting and is still surprised that she’s the No. 1-ranked boxer in the country.
“Sometimes I’m like, ‘Wait, me, number one?’” she said. “There are many thoughts in my head and I don’t know how to feel. I just feel proud and I don’t want to lose that spot.”
Jardines said her older brother started going to gym too and was curious to see what it was like. She was inspired to join the sport after learning she could stay in shape and it also helped overcome her shyness, which is one of the reasons kids tend to join the club.
“Coming to boxing has helped me a lot,” she said. “I’m not really as shy as before. I put dedication into the sport and even in school. When I’m presenting I’m not like before, all over the place.”
When Rivera was younger she used to get bullied by a girl and would run home sad or even crying. She told her dad about it and he said she had to figure out a way to defend herself.
“I used to be kind of shy, so I wouldn’t really stand up for myself,” Rivera said.
Then one day she visited her grandma who lives right across the street from the boxing club. Rivera went with her dad to check out the gym and decided to give it a try. That was a little more than seven years ago and she hasn’t stopped going since.
Rivera said she never imagined herself fighting in the ring because she was such a “girly-girl” when she was younger. She believes joining the Salinas Boxing Club has made her a better person by becoming more disciplined and involved in things that she never used to do.
“I used to be really shy to speak in public and I still am,” Rivera said. “But doing this, being up in the ring and having a lot of people watch you, also helps me out with that because I wouldn’t be able to perform and be a boxer if I can’t control it. So yeah, it has helped me out a lot.”
Juan Reyes can be reached at (831) 726-4360
http://www.montereyherald.com/20180325/salinas-boxing-club-asserts-a-healthy-boxing-influence
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