Victoria Lomax: “This will be the first time Shona Whitwell will know and feel that she has been in a fight.”

Victoria Lomax: “This will be the first time Shona Whitwell will know and feel that she has been in a fight.”

“I can’t wait.” Victoria Lomax says of her next fight. “In boxing, it’s my first fight in the UK.” Born in Bury, Lancashire, Lomax now resides in Malaga, Spain. The 35-year-old owns and runs a gym with her husband. Long days teaching willing recruits in kickboxing. A sport that was her first love.

Lomax makes her return to UK soil to take on the unbeaten and highly-regarded Shona Whitwell on a Top Tier Promotion in Brentwood, Essex, on the 12th July.

“I know she is very good,” Lomax says of her next opponent. “Very technical. But put it this way, to see her defence, I have had to look at her amateur fights. She hasn’t had anyone throw back at her yet. So what defence has she got? We’ll see.”

“I think this will be her first proper fight,” Lomax added. “This will be the first time Shona Whitwell will know and feel that she has been in a fight. All I know is that no matter what happens, I will put on a show. I am going to go in there and throw everything at it. I am confident of winning.”

After around 50 fights in kickboxing, a routine training session eventually forced Lomax to try elsewhere in the world of combat sports. “I have got an injury in my left knee. It was sparring with my trainer, I blocked a low kick with my knee, and when I put my foot down, my knee wasn’t there anymore. It was gone. I tried to keep fighting after that, but I realised I couldn’t do it anymore. In boxing, there is a lot of movement, but I don’t have to put all my weight on one foot. It’s a bit different. I can handle it.”

Lomax turned to boxing. But the harsh realities of her new sport quickly became apparent. In 2024, Lomax accepted a fight on short notice against Victoria Albons but lost a wafer-thin decision after four rounds. It’s fair to say, Lomax isn’t in agreement with the decision that saw her new career start with a defeat.

“I was supposed to fight her in kickboxing, but the fight fell through,” Lomax relayed to me. “But they rang me with two weeks to go; I was 68 kg, and the fight was at 58. Within two weeks, I lost the weight, got my boxing licence, and fought her on her home show. She connected five times in the whole fight, but they still gave it to her. That was a big robbery, and I thought, ” Is this how the boing game is going to be?”

Two more defeats followed. Lomax had issues with both. But three wins followed before a defeat to the unbeaten Itzel Cristino Ruiz in March. That 3-4 resume might be somewhat deceiving.

Lomax isn’t big on the bare statistics. “I have never looked at records,” Lomax says. “In kickboxing, which is my background, it is not about records; it’s about who you have fought. In kickboxing, I fought the Katie Taylors of the kickboxing world. So this girl will not bring anything I haven’t seen before. I have fought them all before in kickboxing.”

Fighting has played a major part in her life. It has changed it in so many ways. “I just love it. It’s the feeling you get from it. Nothing else gives you that feeling. I started because I was an overweight kid. I was 100 kilos. My mum sent me to see a psychologist because I kept getting aggressive out of nowhere. She said I have got too much energy, and I need to burn it off. When I got in the car, there were some English radio stations over here, and an advert came on for kickboxing. At the time, I couldn’t watch boxing on TV. I didn’t like seeing people fight. I went to the kickboxing and went down to 55 kilos. I lost a lot of weight. I went down to 55, and started fighting, and that was it then.”

Lomax has long days. Early starts. Late finishes. The day job incorporates her boxing training. Lomax is ever grateful to her long-time sponsor, David Carter, the CEO and founder of New Life Rehab. A hard sport is a little bit easier because of Carter.

The fight with Shona Whitwell next month could be career-defining. If Lomax can upset the odds, everything changes for her. But the 35-year-old is level-headed about her ambitions.

“It’s to see where I can get,” Lomax told me. “Even though they haven’t given me the decision, I am beating girls who are supposed to be pretty good. So let’s just see where this goes. But I reckon I can go pretty far.”