Pasadena residents Christian Camarena, welterweight, and David Mijares, junior middleweight, are scheduled to compete in the California Golden Gloves State Championships on Saturday, April 11, in Visalia, CA, after clinching district boxing titles at the annual Southern California Golden Gloves Tournament March 17-21 in Los Angeles.
Camarena, 18, is a senior at Pasadena High School, and Mijares, 19, is a freshman at Santa Monica College. Both amateur pugilists have trained under the expert guidance of Villa-Parke Community Center’s boxing coach Fausto De La Torre since 2010.
If Camarena or Mijares capture state titles in April, they can advance to the National Golden Gloves Championships May 11-16 in Las Vegas and will be one step closer to their dreams of competing at the Summer Olympics. A win at the national championships would qualify the competitors for the 2016 Summer Olympic trials. If they qualify at the Olympic trials, they will be eligible to compete as part of the U.S. Olympic Team.
The Villa-Parke Community Center Boxing Program was established in the 1940s and has since become a training ground for many Olympic hopefuls and professional boxers. The program is open to male and female competitors ages 8 and older. Coach De La Torre, a former amateur boxer and product of the Villa-Parke Community Center Boxing Program, has been the program’s head trainer for 18 years.
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