Earlier this year, Emmett, who is a sixth-grader at Cuellar Middle School in Weslaco and trains out of Barrientes Boxing Gym in Mercedes, earned a silver medal at the South Texas Junior Olympics to go along with the Ringside World Title belt he captured this past summer.
Now the young fighter will represent Texas at the upcoming Regional Silver Gloves Boxing Tournament next month in Little Rock, Arkansas. He earned that right by winning yet another title belt at the Texas State Silver Gloves event in McKinney last week. He’ll travel to Little Rock on Jan 11 as part of the RGV Elite Boxing Team where he’ll compete in the 10- 11-year-old, 60-pound division.
“I’m very happy to have won the State Silver Gloves and even happier that I’m going to represent the whole State of Texas in January at regionals,” Emmett said. “I understand that I have to work twice as hard to win regionals and I have to stay twice as focused, and I’m definitely ready to bring home that title back to Weslaco.”
Emmett’s training schedule in truly brutal as he runs about two miles daily in addition to spending hours in the gym working on his style and boxing techniques. However, he loves every minute of it, his father says.
“He’s in the gym every day, including Sundays when he works on his cardio,” said Emmett’s father, Albert. “He really loves to train, though. He’s just very motivated to always get better.”
But no matter how involved he may be with training for his next fight, his schoolwork always comes first.
“He knows that he won’t be able to do any type of training until his work at school is done,” Albert said. “He stays on top of things because he wants to make sure he can box.”