There is an old quote Caroline Dubois refers to when discussing her path in professional boxing. ‘Work so hard that your idols become your rivals.’
The 20-year-old, one of British boxing’s best young talents, is now set make her professional debut on 20 November. While there is still lingering disappointment over an Olympic campaign in the summer that promised so much but failed to deliver medal success, her focus is now on a fast-tracked route to world title success, beating some of the fighters she grew up idolising in the process.
Six boxing medal successes marked Great Britain’s best ever return from an Olympic Games in the summer but Dubois, already a decorated amateur champion, returned empty-handed after falling to a narrow defeat at the quarter-final stage.
The Londoner was one of the first of the 2020 team to leave amateur boxing, signing a professional deal with Boxxer and Sky Sports after turning down a number of other offers from leading promoters.
To guide her on the journey, Dubois has linked up with trainer Shane McGuigan, whose stable also includes brother Daniel, WBO cruiserweight champion Lawrence Okolie and undefeated prospect Ellie Scotney among others.
‘It was actually me who started training with Shane before my brother,’ Dubois told Metro.co.uk.
‘Leading into the Olympics I was saying to myself I’d be turning professional after so I was going around seeing a few coaches. One of those was Shane. As soon as I got on the pads with him I felt that connection straight away. He was showing me things I had never been shown before, how to move after punches.
‘I’m still young, I want to go on the pads and not just feel good about it, I want to learn on them too. I was telling Daniel how good Shane was, my dad was there too, and he saw how good Shane was. That was a good option for him too. So when things were going a little pear-shaped for him [Daniel], Shane was the right option too.’
Dubois’ professional journey begins later this month at Wembley Arena in a lightweight division still ruled by Katie Taylor. With Great Britain’s Natasha Jonas, another fighter who Dubois grew up watching, also still at the top of the division, the youngster is keen to capitalise on what she identifies as a gulf in talent that exists in the division and haul herself into its top bracket as soon as possible and put some of the division’s best ‘to shame’.
‘We are working so hard, pushing ourselves and speeding ourselves up,’ Dubois said. ‘The lightweight division is a very good division, it is one in which women can naturally walk around at. There are so many at a good level here and I want to be right in the mix.
‘Personally, I’ve been thinking about it [mixing with Natasha Jonas and Katie Taylor] every day. Female boxing is at that point where it is growing but where the levels aren’t as high as in amateur boxing. You have the beginner level, journey women opponents you can easily beat up and who you are expected to win against, but then there is that massive jump to world class level.
‘There really isn’t that in between. So after a few of those early ones, there is nowhere else to go but to step up instantly. It depends on the person, whether they are good enough to take that massive leap and I think I am. I feel if I get in the ring with a lot of these people now, I’ll be embarrassing them. I’ll be putting them to shame.
‘With the jump from amateur and professional, there is going to be a few differences I will have to get used to. But it depends on me and people around me and what we think I am ready for. As soon as I get that green light I’m going for it and I feel like I am ready for that now, to be honest.’
Unified champion Taylor remains a dream fight for Dubois and for anyone else competing in the division but with the Bray fighter 36 next year and with a showdown with Amanda Serrano looming in 2022, there paths may not cross.
‘I don’t know how long she intends to stay in the game. I know the talk of her and Amanda Serrano is still around but I feel that is going to be a very difficult fight for her. Another Define Persoon fight for her, very physical, very demanding. How she comes out of that fight determines what she is going to do next.’
While her new journey is underway, there has been time for reflection on the Olympic campaign that fell apart when it truly mattered. Having operated at the highest level in the amateurs despite her tender years, the experience in Tokyo is tinged with regret. But Dubois is happy to take the good with the bad, acknowledging that setbacks early on in her career will serve her better down the road.
‘I think maybe in five or six years, I’ll turn around and say that I am happy I went and that I achieved what I did to get there. But looking at it now, the Olympics is still a recent memory and every time I think about it, I think: ‘Damn I wish I could do that again.’ Correct some things and push myself that bit further.
‘But it is what it is. Every experience you have in life is a make or break situation. You use it to make you or it will break you. I went into that at 20 years old, I was a baby compared to some of the women there. I’m happy I went and qualified, because qualifying is sometimes twice as hard then competing in the Games itself, it is serious business.
‘It’s funny. Somebody told me, if you go into a tournament and you haven’t done everything properly but you still manage to win, you are not really going to change. You won and in your mind, nothing needs changing.
‘But in losing, you instantly know why you lost and you know what you need to correct for the future. Maybe it was a blessing in disguise. Coming up to my next fights, I will be getting everything right that I got wrong.’
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