Crystal Chambers: “Boxing is all I have left of my dad. I’ve been pulling myself out of tough places since I was a child, and that has shown me that I am built to last.”

Crystal Chambers: “Boxing is all I have left of my dad. I’ve been pulling myself out of tough places since I was a child, and that has shown me that I am built to last.”

It was very much a blank canvas. A new story to tell. But with little information on hand, I wasn’t sure what I would get. Would there be enough colour to paint a worthwhile picture of words I wondered when my attempts at research ended largely without reward? But within a few seconds of our connection over Zoom, any concerns I had were soon cast aside. A new story indeed. And a very good one also.

Later this month, Crystal Chambers will be the latest fighter to join the ongoing revolution of women’s boxing. It is some story. A remarkable one in many ways. Inspiring even. A life in boxing that wasn’t her life. But unbeknown to Chambers, it probably was somewhere deep within. It was always lingering it seems. The seed that was planted by her father some thirty years previously finally blossomed just a few short years ago.

Chambers had just turned forty. Her boxing life was about to begin.

“I grew up in Texas, just south of Dallas,” Chambers told me as she relayed her life up to that recent pivotal moment. “My dad, Jon Chambers, was a boxer. He beat Donald Curry. He was almost an Olympian. He made it to the final round but lost by a split decision. My dad was good. He was a Golden Gloves Champion. He idolised Tommy Hearns. People used to say he was the white Tommy Hearns because he was a tall skinny boxer with long arms. He was going to turn pro but ended up getting hooked on drugs. So he went to the Army to try and get clean. He tried multiple things to try and get clean from drugs, but he kept going back on drugs every time he went back to normality.”

Her father was at times just a distant part of her life. But subconsciously, he was always there as was the sport that defined him. When a new life decade had begun, he would become something more. And so would boxing.

“My dad did teach me to box in the backyard when I was young,” Chambers told me. “He taught me the boxer mentality, and I naturally became a fighter in more ways than one. He wasn’t in my life for a big portion of it because he was on drugs, and my mum kept him away from me. But when I was ten I got to meet him and when I was eleven a girl beat me up after school. I am his only child, so he taught me how to box because of that. My dad didn’t want me to get beat up. He wasn’t trying to mould me into a boxer. But when he started to train me so I could protect myself, he thought I was good. He wanted me to box, but I wasn’t interested. I was a nice girl. I didn’t want to hit anyone. My dad wanted me to go back the very next day with that same girl and be the aggressor. But I never went back, I didn’t do it.

“But I did get attacked in a hallway in 9th grade. But my dad taught me well, and I very much protected myself. My adrenaline took over, and I beat her up pretty bad. But it was because someone came at me, I wasn’t the aggressor.”

Those early seeds would eventually shape her later life. The family life consumed Crystal Chambers for twenty years. But those seeds her father had planted all those years ago in her mind were starting to shape the next stage of her life.

“I didn’t pursue boxing. I had kids pretty young. I was a mum for all that time. My youngest has just turned twenty. But when he turned eighteen a few years ago, I realised I hadn’t really established a life outside of these children. Like most mums, all of your identity is in them. But they all went off and did their own thing. So, I started thinking about what I wanted to see for myself. I was missing my dad a lot. He had died when I was nineteen, so I didn’t really grieve that. It all started flooding back, and I was getting a little lost,” Chambers says of that time before boxing truly found her. Although, in truth, it probably never left her even if she hadn’t realised it.

“I remembered one time when I was crying over a boy and my dad had said you can’t cry over a boy, they will always do this to you. It was kind of a sad thing to say to a fourteen-year-old girl that everyone would leave. But he said one thing you can always count on is boxing. It was kind of funny when he said it because he was a boxer, I wasn’t. So I sort of disregarded that statement and never thought about it again until two years ago.

“But I had a series of events that happened two years ago that led me back to my dad’s beloved sport (boxing). It was a tough time in my life when I experienced a lot of loss. When I was at the very bottom of the ocean of pain and had no real reason to swim up again; boxing was what compelled me to once again face everything and rise. It helped me see that I still had plenty of fight left in me. Boxing gets me in the present and helps me leave behind the uncontrollable pains of life. Boxing is the highest form of meditation because it forces you to confine yourself to the present moment. My dad said, “Boxing would always be there for me, and it could pull me out of anything.”

“There’s a line in a song that says, ‘They called me weak like I was not just somebody’s daughter.’

“I heard it, and I remembered who I was. I was Jon Chambers’ daughter before I was anything else, and he was strong, dominant, even invincible almost. Boxing is all I have left of my dad. I’ve been pulling myself out of tough places since I was a child, and that has shown me that I am built to last.”

Inspired by many things, Chambers started her new life. The early steps were tentative, but they very quickly morphed into something more. Much more.

“I started out at the Title Boxing Club, just for fitness,” Chambers told me. “But immediately, I started to hunger for more. So I started paying the people there who did fight to give me private training. From there, I went to the Kronk Gym and started getting training from Johnathon Banks, and then I went to Kara Ro. I got super hungry and just wanted to be in the gym every single day. I love it and it’s been really good for me too.”

Her father was a more than talented amateur. Any win over Donald Curry tells you that. Especially, back then. A decorated fighter who had potential but his life and career were sadly blighted by the demons and a fight he couldn’t win.

But the unfinished and unfulfilled story of her father has inspired that new beginning for his only daughter. Chambers will make her professional debut on June 21st in Detroit. It is her debut period. With no amateur fights to her name, Chambers has gone in deep in memory of her father. The ring walk will be made with shoes carrying a little personal reminder of why she is entering the sport at this level.

“My dad wanted to go pro, but the drugs kept him from it. So, I wanted to have one pro-fight for my dad. I am going to have him incorporated into my pro debut,” Chambers says of why she is making her maiden ring walk of any description later this month. “I am going to walk out to Space Oddity by David Bowie, which is one of my dad’s favourite songs. This fight is dedicated to my dad for sure. But I do love the whole journey of training and sparring.”

Chambers talked about that tough period in her life. A time of loss. A time when she was looking for more. One part of her life had ended. She wanted a new chapter to begin with a little homage to her past.

“Boxing has given me a lot of self-confidence and self-love,” Chambers told FightPost. “As a boxer, you have to have a good headspace. People think it is an angry sport, but it’s not. If you come in angry, you are going to lose. You have to have good confidence in yourself. You have to believe you are going to win.”

Chambers has impeccable company to start that new beginning. Jackie Kallen will manage and guide Chambers through those often stormy waters that boxing can bring. Kallen has done everything in the sport. Her time with James Toney is one of legend. Chambers is in good hands as her boxing life begins in just a few short weeks.

“It is such an honour working with Jackie,” Chambers says. “She actually reached out to me. I would never have thought that Jackie Kallen would want to be my manager. But I do see her all the time on the scene. We are always at the shows together. I see Tommy Hearns a lot, which is cool because he is my idol, and I get to hang out with Tommy. But I just posted about the fight and my dad, and she reached out to me and said I would love to manage you. I was just flabbergasted and couldn’t believe that it was real.”

At 42, Chambers is late to the game. But she seems unfazed about entering her new world so late in the day.

“I’ve had a mindset all my life that if I want to do something, nothing will stop me. But it was hard getting training as a female and people taking you seriously. I told the story about my dad, and nobody seemed interested. If you are somewhat attractive, some trainers are more interested in you personally. That is why I train with Kara now because it is more comfortable for me.”

Kara Ro is at the helm. A fighter who didn’t lose in eighteen professional fights in her career. They seem a perfect fit for each other in many ways.

“Kara inspires me.,” Chambers says of her trainer. “Not just because she’s my trainer, but because she doesn’t believe in limits and she very much believes in comebacks. In her prime fighting years, her husband suddenly died, and she then took eleven years off from boxing and was almost forty-seven when she returned.”

Chambers will operate around the featherweight limit when her new life starts in Detroit. An opponent already locked in. Fellow American, Shamiah Jones will be in the opposite corner on June 21st. The first opponent on her new journey. There could be more. That initial thought of just having one fight in memory of her father already looks like it could turn into a full-blown run at the sport.

“I want respect,” Chambers says of what she wants out of the sport. But there are thoughts of titles further down the road. “When I see other fighters holding those belts, it hits me hard. I want those belts. If I can get there 100% I want that.”

That young girl who was taught to box by her father just so she could defend herself is long gone. Boxing eventually came back around and found her again after more than thirty years lingering in the shadows. Crystal Chambers might have returned somewhat later than many before her. But there is something in her words that tells you she just might make up for that lost time in the years to come.

Driven on and inspired by memories of the past, she wants create a lasting legacy in the name of her father, who started the whole journey in that back garden thirty-plus years ago. You sense, Crystal Chambers will do just fine. A true sliding doors moment. Her father will be extremely proud. What could have been, now will be.

“The loss of my father will always sting. But now, everything that I do is in honour of him and celebrates his life.” Adrienne C. Moore