Our Story

DC Boxing

Founded in 2019

DC Boxing was founded in 2019 as a community group by Ian Huddleston and David Robinson. The initial idea of the project came from doing community organising “listenings” on the doorstep in and around Dinnington. After speaking to over 200 residents, the main issues that came out of those conversations were that there was a lot of antisocial behaviour in the area and nothing for the young people to do.

From this feedback the group decided it would be beneficial to speak to the young people of the area to get their thoughts and ideas, so we ran a workshop at the local youth club, and they overwhelmingly said that there weren’t enough sporting activities to do. There is a lack of local provision for young people in the area for sporting activities, so this project looked to be a way of addressing these issues and will engage young people.

Community Ran

The group & board is made up of residents who have listened to community needs and want to address these issues themselves. David is a boxing coach and was approached by Ian, who was working at Rotherham federation of communities (Rotherfed) community charity if he would put on some boxing sessions with the young people of the area. This was funded by Rotherfed who purchased gloves, pads, skipping ropes to get started. These sessions were a real success, so the group decided with Rotherfed to become constituted, so we could put on more sessions and do more for the young people of the community.
DC Boxing
DC Boxing

During Lockdown

The sessions grew in popularity, and so the group moved to running weekly Saturday morning sessions at Middleton Hall, Dinnington and this continued.

Covid-19 and Lockdown meant we weren’t able to run our sessions as we did before, so we had to adapt how we still engaged with our young people. We managed to keep in touch using zoom and youtube, putting on weekly online sessions through zoom, and also offering youtube videos where they could train at home.

Partnerships

At the start of 2022, Ian took over running of the group full time, after being successful in a major funding bid with the National Lottery reaching communities fund. This has allowed him to manage the group and start developing and growing the organisation. Since then, the group have secured partnerships with Empire Fighting chance who are a leading sport for development charity based in Bristol, South Yorkshire Police Violence reduction unit, Joe Wicks Body Coach, Voluntary Action Rotherham, JADE Youth and Community, Rotherham United Community Trust, RMBC, Early Help and continue to grow, working with several schools across our community, working with hundreds of young people making a positive impact.
DC Boxing