The Hankinson Boxing Gym in Aiken brought home more hardware from the 2024 USA Boxing National Junior Olympics at the end of June.
The gym left Wichita, Kansas with three gold and two bronze medals along with a lifetime of memories from their trip. Willie Franklin, James Hankinson Jr. and Zedric Swedenburg came in first in their brackets while Si’Yonna Price and Morgan Brown finished third after falling in the semifinals.
“We had a very good experience,” Swedenburg said. “We trained hard to build up for this moment. We had five national champions and it was really great. I really had a lot of fun.”
Due to the varying amount of a boxers competing in each weight class, not all brackets were the same size and some only had one or two competitors. For Swedenburg and Hankinson Jr., their medals came because they were the only ones in their weight class. They both earned a spot at nationals after winning first place at the state championships.
Franklin competed in an eight-tier bracket in the Bantam 106 lb. weight class, with six boxers from around the country. He beat two boxers on his way to the final match where he took down Kansas City’s Hudson Ndubuisi for the title.
“I feel like a top dog when I went inside the ring,” he said. “Good dedication and hard work. And it felt good to win. And all my other people, they did good, too.”
Price said she didn’t have any expectations around winning going into the competition and she just wanted to do her best. She fell to Belem Aquilar in the final four.
James Hankinson Sr. runs the gym with his wife Brittany and both got the chance to see the result of the group’s hard work throughout the year. They said it was great to see how much they’ve all grown as boxers.
“The experience seeing the kids perform the way I knew they would was amazing,” Hankinson Sr. said. “One of the things, being at the gym, yelling at them all the time, pushing them hard when they want to quit and give up, being the one that (says) you got to keep going, you got to push yourself and to see them get in the ring and push themselves. It was quite an honor because these kids went and they laid everything out on the line.”
Outside of the ring, all the kids got a chance to experience Wichita with indoor water parks, arcades and other activities they don’t have access to in Aiken. Brittany said it was impactful to spend time with the group and to see them have the opportunity to experience a new city.
“It was a very eye-opening experience,” she said. “It was a lot of people from across the world there, so it was great competition. We also had a lot of fun doing different activities with the kids while we were there because in Aiken we don’t have as much to do.”
One of Hankinson’s goals with the boxing gym is to give children in Aiken the resources to get involved in an activity outside of the house, which includes the opportunity for trips like this one. The kids said their favorite parts of Nationals were the plane ride there, getting to meet other boxers from around the county and the indoor water park.
“With the way the economy is going right now with inflation being as high as it is, some parents might not be able to afford to send their kids on trips to take their kids on trips,” Hankinson Sr. said. “So by us being an outlet to provide them to go to a place like Wichita, Kansas or Missouri or Florida, it’s amazing. It’s an amazing experience to them to see something other than Aiken and see something outside of Aiken.”
The trip was made possible with the help of the Rotary Club of Aiken and donations from around the community, he said. Being a nonprofit, the gym benefits from a variety of donations from sports drinks to money to help with their annual Nationals trip.
“I feel like it’s a blessing because when we started, we started from our home,” Brittany said. “So we’re making progress and with the help of God, we’re able to do everything that we’re doing to help others progress.”
Hankinson Sr. encourages people to come to check out the gym at 2266 Edgefield Road as the group continues to train for the next competition. One day he hopes to see a boxer from his gym go on to participate in a larger tournament and possibly even the Olympics.
