The Sweet Science No More.

Remember the days of Lennox Lewis, Shawn O' Sullivan and Willie Dewitt; amateur boxers who were once the pride of Canadian amateur sport. The Canadian Boxing Association wish you did. In a era where Canada's amateur boxing system was ranked in the top 10% in the world in the late 80's and early 90's the organization has fallen upon hard times and is now ranked in the bottom 10% of the world today. What happened?

The answer is a hard one to determine but no doubt can be a culmultion of lack of funds and internal struggles within. To start with funding one has to go back to 1995. In 1995 the government of Canada financed sport to the tune of $47 million per annum, of which $468,000 went to the sport of boxing. By 2006, sport funding had nearly tripled to $140 million per annum, but only $413,000 of that went to the Canadian Boxing Association, a decrease of nearly 11 percent. While certain sports have reaped the windfall of enhanced sport funding Boxing Canada has been a steady loser.

Internally things aren't much better. Pat Fiacco, an official with Boxing Canada and the mayor of Regina claims there is a serious lack of leadership within Boxing Canada. “The current administration is dysfunctional at best,” he says. “There isn’t a permanent national coach, there is no national training centre, our funding has been reduced, and we have half the membership we used to have."

All of which may explain why boxing, once one of Canada’s prolific sports, hasn’t produced an Olympic medallist in twelve years, failed to win a single gold medal at the 2006 Commonwealth Games for the first time in its history, and qualified a single athlete – Adam Trupish – to the 2008 Olympic team.

Interestingly however, Canada's boxers are still amonst the very best.....professionally. Steve Molitor and Artruro Gatti are Canadian legends within the sport. So why is it that Sport Canada, the Own the Podium Program and the COC are allowing the sport to self destruct when it is evident that the sport can continue to produce Olympic medallists.

Isn't it time for someone to assist in the lab find another potion and re-discover the Sweet Science. This blogger thinks so.