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Changing The Face Of Women's
Boxing -
Claudia Ollis
By Barbara Pinnella
On Saturday, September 18th there is a fight at Staples
Center in Los Angeles, California. All boxing fans are well
aware of the match-up between Sergio Mora and Shane Mosley.
This bout has already been beaten to death with opinions and
criticism. But there is one other fight on the card that I
want to talk about – one that is a first in so many ways.
One of the undercard matches will feature Kaliesha West
(12-1-2, 3 KO’s) going up against Angel Gladney (6-2-1, 5
KO’s). This will be the first time that Golden Boy
Promotions has had a women’s match on the card of any of
their events. It will be the first time that Staples Center
has ever hosted a woman fight for a WBO World title. If
victorious, West would be Riverside County’s first World
Champion. Five men have tried and failed.
And at the center of it all is Claudia Ollis. Ollis is the
marketing manager for West, and has had a love of boxing
from a very early age. Her father was a Sergeant. in the
U.S. Army and boxed in the Army, his brother was a pro boxer
in Mexico, and his father was an amateur boxer. “The history
is huge. I grew up watching boxing as a little girl with my
dad, and always had a love for it.”
Ollis also owns two boutiques, and while I thought that made
for quite a division from boxing, she corrected me on that.
“I’m a fashion diva. It’s easy to integrate the two for me.
When I would watch the fights as a little girl, I would see
that everyone would dress up, and it just went hand in hand
for me. I would see boxing, but I would see the glamour part
of it.”
But just how did she get together with West? Well, her son
was instrumental in that. He boxed with Kaliesha when they
were kids. “I’ve know Kaliesha for a long time, but been
together with her officially for about a year now,” she told
me. “My son watched the struggles of female boxers. For
years he would tell me, ‘Mom, sponsor Kaliesha, sponsor
Kaliesha,’ but I thought that if I was going to sponsor
something I’m going to sponsor a little girls’ soccer team,
something like that,” she laughed. “When I do something, I’m
going to do something big with her.
“Last year, after my divorce and moving to the beach, I
opened another store in Laguna Beach, but it was not the
right time to do that. I like to do a million things at one
time, and I began working with Kaliesha. As the months
progressed we went to Denmark and Peru, and by visiting
these other countries I saw all the pitfalls here of female
fighters. I realized that in the United States they don’t
even know half of the amazing fighters that there are in
female fighting.
“It’s a challenge for me, and I like challenges. Female
fighting is really big in Europe. Wherever we walked in
Denmark everybody knew who we were. The popularity of it,
people coming to see us and interviewing us, the way they
treated us, it was just fascinating. That’s when I thought,
‘This is crazy. We live in the best country in the world,
and we don’t get this in the United States.’ So for me I
knew that something had to be done.”
Claudia continued. “I did my research. In the 80’s all the
female fighters, they got acknowledged, but it wasn’t on the
level of what it is today. And I’ve heard it from the big
boys. They tell me, ‘Claudia, we just don’t know if you know
boxing, it’s not a gig.’ And I have told them that I know
that, but I want to change their minds. For the first time
in the history of the Olympics female fighting, that’s been
around for about 40 years, is going to be featured in the
Olympics. There will be three weight classes that will be
featured.”
Ollis reminded me of women’s tennis, and how no one would
pay much attention to it. That is, until it was included in
the Female Olympic Games. “Once that happened,” she said,
“it all changed immediately. Why? Because now we had Gold
Medalists. The United States had to acknowledge that these
were Gold Medalists. That’s why it changed.
“And here we are, 40 years later, female boxing is being
acknowledged by the entire world and the promoters cannot
hide any longer. They have to acknowledge these women as
professional athletes regardless of their sex.
“And that has been my platform,” she continued. “Whether you
are a fight fan or not, it’s not really about boxing
anymore, it’s about making a change, making these women feel
like they’re athletes. It’s not that they want to be a man,
but they need to be acknowledged as athletes, too.”
But things are changing, little by little. Ollis has a
working relationship with certain people now, but it has not
been easy. “it’s been a challenge to get through those
barriers, because they see no money in it. That is one of
the first things they say. Well how do you know there’s no
money in it? What level have you tried it? You’ve never
promoted a female. You’ve had female fights, but never
anybody of this caliber.
“My girl is number one Bantamweight in the world without a
title. She’s number one in the world in 118 pound class,
Kaliesha West. You can’t tell me you don’t see the money
when you’ve never even tried it. And the Staples Center has
never shown a female fighter fighting for a WBO World title.
“So all of this is a challenge,” she told me. “Definitely a
good challenge. I have many, many projects coming up, and
it’s a very exciting thing for me. It’s a lot of work, but
it’s exciting at the same time, because I’ve made headway.
Look, we are fighting in our country, for the WBO title –
what an opportunity! And Kaliesha is a very exciting
fighter. She will put on a good show.”
Claudia feels that now that the fight between Juan Manuel
Lopez and Rafael Marquez has been postponed, this will be
one of the important fights of the year. With no other fight
to create diversion, attention will be focused on this one,
and for that reason, more awareness will be put on the fight
between West and Gladney.
Ollis’ platform is to change the face of women’s boxing. She
is within two weeks of a big step in the right direction,
when two women fighters face off on a Saturday night in Los
Angeles.
Good luck to both Kaliesha and Angel, and thank you to
Claudia for her time.
Be safe and God Bless,
Viva La Raza,
Barb.
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