How does the phrase go? Find something you love doing,
and you never work a day in your life?
Justus Pomeroy knows he’s found something he loves, and
the work is turning out to be pretty enjoyable as well.
It has been seven years since Pomeroy discovered boxing,
and the 19-year-old Winona resident has embraced it ever since.
“He had biked down to the Winona Lions Den Boxing Club,
came back home and said he wanted to join boxing,” coach, mentor and
grandfather Bill Pomeroy said.
“At the time he was in football, so I told him he’d have
to wait until after football season was over because you can’t do two sports at
one time.
“I had just figured he’d forget about it by the time
football was over, but after football season, he went back and he joined the
amateur boxing club.”
To join the Golden Gloves amateur boxing ranks, one must
be at least 17 years old and have a minimum of 10 open bouts under his belt.
Justus joined Golden Gloves at the age of 18, and with an overall record of
11-7, earned the Upper Midwest welterweight division championship on April 27
with a three-round decision over Saint Paul’s Maurice Fuller at Cass Lake,
Minn.
The next step was the National Golden Gloves competition
on May 13 in Salt Lake City, Utah, but Justus’ back, which has a tendency to
flare up from time-to-time, began giving him problems.
“I believe it came from playing football,” Justus Pomeroy
said. “The doctors said they didn’t see anything medically wrong with it, but
the physical therapist said it’s a product of bad posture and not working my
back out enough when I was younger. I do a lot more back and shoulder work to
help it out, but every once in a while it flares up.”
The national Golden Gloves competition would have to
wait.
“I was crushed, absolutely crushed. I don’t really leave
the state much, so to get to meet people at nationals like coaches, fans and
other boxers would have been a whole different environment that would be an
awesome thing to be around,” Justus Pomeroy said.
That momentary disappointment did not blind Pomeroy from
his ultimate goal.
Muhammad Ali once said, “I hated every minute of
training, but I said, ‘Don’t quit. Suffer now and live the rest of your life as
a champion.’”
Pomeroy, on the other hand, loves to train.
Be it sprints, cardio, shadow boxing, working the heavy
bag, crunches, push-ups or lunges, Pomeroy pushes himself hour after hour.
“You’ve got to have a lot of determination,” Pomeroy
said. “You get those days when you don’t want to go to the gym, but I’ve
noticed at the gym that I’m kind of a role model for some of the younger guys.”
And though Pomeroy aspires to continue boxing, it is
training and mentoring that he plans to turn into a career.
Pomeroy plans to attend either the Southeast Technical
College or Winona State this fall to study anatomy and physiology with a goal
of becoming a physical trainer.
“I love creating workouts, it’s one of my hobbies,”
Pomeroy said. “It would be fun to give workouts to other people and help them
grow.”
Combine the determination of a boxer with a passion for
training and you don’t get far unless you have a plan, and that, too, plays
right into Pomeroy’s hand.
“Working out is like eating,” Pomeroy said. “You go in
and see all that good food, and your eyes are bigger than your stomach.
“You’ve got all these plans, but if you don’t write them
down your eyes are bigger than your stomach, then you get halfway done and
you’re like, ‘Oh, I’m full,’” Pomeroy said.
So Pomeroy documents his plans, even to the point where
checklists play a small role in his perfectionism. Having worked as a delivery
man for Erberts & Gerberts, he noted that it was “not the hardest job
ever,” but that knowing the streets was a must.
Pomeroy found himself driving around town to see if he
could remember the names of the streets.
“Little things like that stick with you from boxing,”
Pomeroy said. “I’ve noticed at the gym that I’m kind of a role model for some
of the younger guys. I want to transfer that over to being a trainer. I’ve been
told to aim high and keep your goals in front of you so you have something to
strive for.” (Read the original story)
