Gonzalez Dreaming Of Gold In Paris After Successful Return To USA Boxing

Light-weight Jajaira Gonzalez is likely to be the youthful sister {of professional} boxers Joet and Jousce Gonzalez, however she desires to be seen as a fighter in her personal proper fairly than merely the fighters’ sister.

The 27-year-old Gonzalez is aiming to win gold as she heads to the Paris 2024 Olympics this summer time, representing the US. 

Joet, 30, is a former world-title challenger, whereas Jousce, 28, is an undefeated light-weight who has been inactive in current instances. The 27-year-old Jajaira is an Olympian, but she thought she is likely to be executed with boxing by 2020. Affected by burnout, she didn’t battle within the Olympic Trials in 2019.

“At first, it type of did hassle me, as a result of I used to be considering that I’m my very own individual,” Gonzalez instructed BoxingScene. “On the finish of the day, I prefer to suppose I solely have myself. My dad did assist me alongside the way in which and a few of my brothers have been encouraging me, however every thing I needed to undergo to get right here, it was all me.”

Gonzalez got here again to boxing in 2021. She hadn’t competed at a nationwide degree since dropping on the 2018 USA Nationwide Championships quarterfinals to Amelia Moore. She moved to Virginia, and commenced working a full-time job as a kickboxing teacher for the fitness center chain I Love Kickboxing. 

“I used to be sitting there bored at some point scrolling by means of Instagram USA Boxing and so they have been in Spain and I had all the time wished to go to Spain,” Gonzalez recalled. “I must be there, I must be touring the world doing what I really like and I’m sitting right here working a daily job. That motivated me.”

After the pandemic, Gonzalez moved again to California and educated along with her father, Jose Gonzalez, then gained nationals in December. That bought her on the USA Boxing workforce and allowed her to coach in Colorado Springs. The return of Gonzalez to a outstanding function in USA Boxing has been one of many huge tales of the 2024 Olympic workforce.

“This can be a once-in-a-lifetime factor. Not lots of people can say they’re Olympians,” said Gonzalez. “Being an Olympian is the objective, however it’s not the primary objective. I’m solely midway there to my final objective which is getting an Olympic gold medal.”

Gonzalez isn’t ruling out a possible second Olympic bid both, regardless of being but to make her first within the upcoming Paris Video games, which run from late July to early August.

“For some purpose, I don’t know whether it is simply me, even with all I really feel I wouldn’t nonetheless be totally glad with boxing being an Olympic gold medalist,” mirrored Gonzalez. “I might see considering to myself okay I bought one, however might I get two?”

Of her 13 worldwide medals, Gonzalez’s most significant got here on the Santiago 2023 Pan American Video games. Gonzalez gained bronze and punched her ticket to the Olympics. Her loss got here within the quarter-finals to present IBF ladies’s light-weight world champion and 2020 Olympic silver medalist Beatriz Ferreira.