Mikaela Mayer – someone to root for

Phil Gurnee ♦ August 12, 2016 ♦ 1 Comment

For the first time in my life, I have an almost direct connection to an Olympic Athlete giving me someone to really root for.  Her name is Mikaela Mayer and she is competing in the lightweight boxing division in Rio. It is not my connection it is my wife’s but I’ll take it. My wife is a fourth-grade teacher who taught Mikaela’s sister, and Mikaela’s other sister was Verdell’s student teacher several years ago.  As a teacher and student teacher tend to do they developed a strong bond and we were invited to her wedding last summer. All the sisters came through the Woodlake / Hale / El Camino Real Woodland Hills school group of Elementary/Middle/High.

Even without the connection, Mikaela’s story is a great one. A gifted athlete she lost herself in high school but found herself again in a local boxing club on Shoup. Eventually, her boxing skills would take her to Northern University Michigan, to train with Al Mitchell.  Her father had bugged Al Mitchell to train her but he kept refusing to train a female boxer. Her father persisted however and Al finally agreed to train her.

California across the country, to train with one of the world’s best boxing coaches in Marquette, Michigian – known for training amateur and professional champions – Al Mitchell.

He has said that when he saw the stunning California beauty he didn’t expect much from her in the ring. She had work to do and was unable to make the 2012 Olympic team, but that just made her work harder and now the one time model turned boxer is hoping to medal in Rio. People tend to underestimate beautiful people as not being tough. If you watch her this week, you won’t think she’s not tough anymore.

You can read or watch more video of her story here

and more images here

First victory can be seen here: