WHEN Ladd’s Boxing Club’s Gab Toutai represents South Australia at next week’s Elite National Boxing Championships, he will be only the second Mildura boxer to do so in 30 years.
Ladd’s Dom Marciano competed at the event in 2018, more than 30 years after Mildura’s last national fighter Mark Saris fought.
Toutai’s younger sister Lainesia was recently crowned Australian champion after winning gold in the girls’ 60kg division at the Australian Schools Boxing Championship.
Gab will look to add another trophy to the family’s shelf.
Boxing Coach Jackson Ladd said Toutai’s success had coincided with the boom in boxing in Mildura.
“There has been a lot of youths that have gone to nationals but there hasn’t been that many seniors, not since the 50s to the 80s, there’s been a big 30-year gap from the 80s until now,” he said.
“There was a lack of a boxing community between that period. There were gyms around but there hasn’t been a community like there is now between us and the other gyms.”
Ladd attributed Toutai’s success to his natural talent combined with his unwavering dedication to his craft.
“Ten per cent of it is talent and 90 per cent of it is hard work and he has that 10 per cent that no one else has, he’s just got it, you’re born with it or you aren’t,” he said.
“Gab is 19 and the guys he is fighting are 25-26 and he has proven that he can fit in with the number one and number two in Australia.”
“He is always training hard, we don’t really have peaks and troughs in training. If you look at other sports, they have time off, Gab hasn’t had a chance to have a rest.”
Ladd said Toutai continued to succeed despite living in a regional area and attributed the success to his coaches and training partners.
“Everyone says you need to be from a big town, you need to go to the cities to be successful, but time and time again, we prove that wrong and that is a testament to what we do down here.”
Toutai will fight in Perth from August 9-12.
