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Trisha Hill
vs.
Silke Weickenmeier
Stuttgart, Germany
on February 14, 2004 |
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Fight review by
Women's Boxing Page correspondent Ewan Whyte
By all accounts, this was a real donnybrook with plenty of raw aggression and little science. The American, who had spent most of the previous day in the sauna in a last minute attempt to make the weight, had, as Peter Selzer picturesquely put it, “the mane of a pony and a punch like the kick of a mule.”
The decisive action came at the end of the sixth round, as Weickenmeier, who had been the busier of the two fighters to that point (though the far stronger American’s work was considered the more effective), surrendered her height advantage in an attempt to pierce Hill’s guard with a jab and follow with a right cross. Hill, holding her hands high with her forearms parallel, effortlessly swatted the jab clear of her face with an anticlockwise, downward sweep of her right hand reminiscent of a powerful windscreen wiper. Now Weickenmeier’s deflected left hand was interfering with her own right cross, but she was committed. Hill saw the opening for a left to the side of Weickenmeier’s head, and as the German closed her eyes, following through blindly with her cross, Hill swatted her —- with almost no backswing -— hard on the right ear with her left hand.
You only have to freeze the image and compare the physique of the two women to see how hopelessly misconceived Weickenmeier’s tactic is; her lithe, athletic body is committed to a lunge that is going nowhere; her right cross passes harmlessly to the side of Hill’s face, as the square-set, muscular American with her huge arms and shoulders, helps her on her way with the left. Logically Weickenmeier must be the taller of the two women, but her head is level with the American’s breast and no more than two feet away, as Hill, who by now has completed the clockwise rotation that accompanied her left to the ear, commences her rotation in the opposite direction. It’s like hitting the heavy bag, and Weickenmeier’s -— one has to say ‘beautiful’ -— face is exactly where she wants it…
Trisha Hill broke Silke Weickenmeier’s nose (and with it, her will) with a right that had the full power of her chunky body behind it. The young German was thrown backwards as though she’d been hit in the chest by a shotgun blast. When the bell sounded for the start of the seventh round, Weickenmeier remained on her stool, and the American claimed the world title, as the German reports put it, ‘on a submission’.
Clearly distraught and fighting back tears at the press conference, Weickenmeier explained that ‘health must come first’ and assured her supporters that she would be back to reclaim her title.
Ewan Whyte | |
