Charan Dhesi: “I live and breathe boxing. It’s all I ever talk about. It’s all I ever do.”

Charan Dhesi: “I live and breathe boxing. It’s all I ever talk about. It’s all I ever do.”

In May, Charan Dhesi created a little slice of boxing history. Dhesi became the first-ever British-born Sikh female professional boxer. It was, in many ways, a dream debut. An impressive 4th round stoppage victory over the tough Amy Greatorex. Women’s boxing badly needs a new star, it might just have found one.

“It was a good experience to be fair,” Dhesi told me over Zoom. “Amy was an experienced fighter. “Everything before the fight was going against me. So, for me to put on that kind of performance was good.

“One of my coaches had an operation. So, I was training on my own for a good four weeks before my fight. I wasn’t getting like regular pad work; it was on and off. The people in my corner, I didn’t know them, I knew of them, but I didn’t know them. They had never trained me before. It was all a bit mad.”

The behind-the-scenes restrictions made that maiden ring walk and the manner of the victory even more impressive. Dhesi, hopefully, with a far more settled training camp, will have fight number two before the year ends. “I am hoping to be out again around November time.”

The Hull-born Dhesi, a promotional free agent, is managed by the former British, Commonwealth, and European champion Esham Pickering. He is very high on his protege. “Charan has just turned 21, and she has great potential,” Pickering says. “She had a very impressive debut. The best I have seen from any female fighter. Charan is very talented, and I feel she has the potential to be a world champion around 2027.”

Dhesi is a full-time boxer, a rare luxury for a fighter who isn’t tied to a major promotion. The Dhesi boxing journey is financed by her parents.

“They just fund it all,” Dhesi relayed to me. “My training, my travelling, my nutrition. It’s hard, but they do it for me because they have to. My dad has always pushed me to do sports. He was the one who raised me, so he always pushed me and my brothers into sports.”

“I live and breathe boxing,” Dhesi added. “It’s all I ever talk about. It’s all I ever do. I don’t have any hobbies outside of boxing; it’s all I have time for.”

Dhesi was still a teenager when boxing initially came into her life. “I did karate until I was about thirteen. My brother went to boxing, and I just stood there. I was watching it, and they were asking me to come in, but I said no. I didn’t even know what it was. I got the punching, but I didn’t know what it was on a deeper level. I did join in eventually, and I started to like it.”

For Charan Dhesi, success came very quickly. “I won my first national title in my fifth fight. I was young, and everyone was making it to be something, and I thought maybe I was good.”

Dhesi was a three-time national champion. A Winter Box Cup Champion, she won a silver medal at the European Championships and was an England international for five years. But once her love for amateur boxing started to dwindle, Dhesi looked for a new challenge.

“I did look at the Olympics, but when I was on the England team, I didn’t have that ambition anymore. It didn’t feel right. I didn’t feel right. I was in college, and when you grow up, things change. I wasn’t really enjoying as much as I once did. I also broke my wrist, and that took me out for around seven months. When I went back into the camps, I didn’t think they were taking me seriously because I had an injury. I didn’t want to go back anymore, so I decided to turn professional, and I finally turned over this year.”

“I think boxing is something different,” Dhesi adds when I enquire what the attraction of boxing is to her. “When people say, ‘What do you do, a doctor or a lawyer?’ I say no, I am a boxer. I’m different, and I want to show girls, especially in my culture, that we can do it. It might be frowned upon. You can do anything you want to do; it’s not what other people want to do. It’s your life.”

At 21, Charan Dhesi has time on her side, and she fully intends to use it. “I am not in a rush to be a world champion. A lot of people are in a rush. There are young people who are saying it as well, and I just think I have got the time. I am going to use that time and do it the proper way. I am going to go at my own pace, and the more experience I get, the better. But when I mature in age, I will fly high.” 

Photo Credit: Humber Boxing Network