It’s a knockout as Trustmarque champion brings IT home at the CRN Fight Night.
We are proud to confirm that Paul ‘Nosebleed’ Neary successfully took down his opponent Steve Ridge at the amateur boxing competition last night (23 May), earning himself the winning title of a CRN Fight Night Champion.
Speaking after the fight, which was held at The Brewery London, Paul said: “I messed him up and exceeded my own expectations. I didn’t think I would finish it but I won after three rounds.”
However, his victory was not without a brutal battle in the ring and Paul took quite a hammering from his “huge” opponent.
“If I could have done anything differently, I would have avoided the heavy shots that he hit me with in the first round. They hurt a lot,” said Paul.
“I have a fat lip and a nosebleed. I did promise everyone a nosebleed and I got one. Actually, I got hit in the face a lot. But that was part of my plan, to distract him with my face and hit him as much as I could.”
Two contenders but only one CRN Fight Night Champion
Trustmarque had two team members competing at the charity event. Alongside Paul, our fearless Account Manager Lewis ‘Foxy Mc Fox Face’ Fox was on the attack, seeing it through to the third round before being defeated by Ben Lang.
Chloe Craughan, Head of Marketing at Trustmarque, who was at the competition cheering on our IT heavyweights with other Trustmarque colleagues said it was an extremely close call.
“It was the closest fight of the night. Lewis did the full three rounds and it was neck and neck all the way. I think if he’d had 30 seconds more then he might have won. He did an amazing job and we were all very proud,” she commented.
“I think I boxed to the best of my ability,” agreed Lewis.” I didn’t win, but to be fair the other guy was better so he deserved to win. I don’t think I could have done anything differently. I gave it my all and it was a great experience.”
Lewis said that he had a weird sensation being in the ring where “literally nothing” was going through his mind. He said the adrenaline made him very focused on just facing the man in front of him and blocking out all the external noise.
Asked whether they will be continuing with competitive boxing, the pair both said it is unlikely. While Lewis wants to continue the boxing training without the competitions, Paul said he will definitely not be fighting again as his wife won’t let him.
Since first launching in 2008, CRN Fight Night has raised over £210k for charity and is the number one place for wannabe boxers from the IT world. Discover more.
So far Lewis and Paul have raised £875 for their chosen charity Special Care Baby Unit York. You can hep them reach their £1000 target by visiting the pair’s Just Giving fundraising page; www.justgiving.com/fundraising/lewisandpaul
We’d like to say a final thanks to the dynamic duo for doing Trustrmarque proud last night. While their participation was a personal venture and not linked to their professional work, we were happy and proud to support them along the way. Well Done guys!
Interview and photographs by Chloe Craughan. Write up by Katherine Murphy, content enthusiast
