ADHD and hobbies.

The never ending carousel.

On Saturday morning I cycled to the gym, but on my way made a detour to the local boxing club. I’m not sure what compelled me to, but something was pulling me there.

I’m not a stranger to boxing. My Dad was fanatical about the sport and would often spar with me from a young age, feinting jabs with accurate precision. I would stay up late watching iconic fights at a time when boxing was enthralling.

Eubank vs Benn, Holyfield v Tyson and Prince Naseem Hamed jumping over the top rope and entering the ring to fight whoever was foolish enough to go up against him.

In my late teens I trained at different gyms, but never consistently. I had my first and only fight in my early twenties for white collar boxing, an organisation that put on fight club style matches for bored office workers.

It was held at the iconic York Hall in Bethnal Green. I was last on the bill and by the time I did my ring walk, I was completely drained from all the nervous energy that had been zapped out of me. My legs felt like jelly and my arms were dead weight.

My boxing nickname was “Sick Boy”, a tongue in cheek reference to catching glandular fever at University and being bed ridden for a year. I’ll never forget the feeling of the ring entrance with friends and family chanting “sick boy, sick boy”. It was electrifying.

In the lead up to the fight, I trained three times a week with former European champion Spencer “The Omen” Oliver. Admittedly “The Omen” has a more sinister ring to it than “sick boy” and perhaps that’s the reason why my boxing career only lasted one fight.

I initially started training at Finchley Boxing Club where none other than former British heavyweight champion Anthony Joshua trained. Rumour has it that there’s an interview on YouTube in which AJ cites “sick boy” as inspiration. “Fighting glandular fever and then going toe to toe for 3 rounds* with a commercial property estate agent was actually siiick”. *(It was a charity fight and as such there was no winner, well not officially..).

As I entered Islington Boxing Club on a whim last Saturday, all these memories came flooding back to me. And I remembered what I had loved so much about the sport. The gym was alive with the sounds of trainers cracking jokes, skipping ropes hitting the floor and hip hop blaring from the speakers.

It felt like the complete opposite of going to the gym, a sterile atmosphere where everyone has their earphones in, whilst excessively grunting mid deadlift before snorting lines of creatine in the changing room.

So I decided to stay and started skipping in front of the mirror, before doing some shadow boxing; and finally putting on some gloves and hitting the bag. In between rounds I watched trainers teaching young kids footwork and combinations. The atmosphere was like something of a bygone era, a part of London life that is rarely seen these days.

As I was finishing up, I noticed a Man setting out some chess boards on tables, so once again curiosity got the better of me. His name is Matthew and for the past fifteen years he’s been running a phenomenon known as chess boxing. The rules are: one round of sparring, followed by six minutes of chess.

Well that was all my ADHD brain and I needed to hear. Two minutes later I had signed up and was slugging it out on the chess board against a steely looking woman called Martha. She bamboozled me with her handwork and soon I was up against the ropes, as she took out my bishop and rook in quick succession.

Next it was a round of sparring against Deli, who had fought in the last chess boxing tournament in October and won by way of knock out. He drove every weekend from Wandsworth to Archway especially to train. The man was dedicated.

It wasn’t long before Martha check mated me and only after revealed her secret strategy. “Always make the last move before the timer goes, that way your opponent has to go first after a round of being hit in the head”.

I left the gym three hours after entering it on a whim, feeling both deliriously happy and exhausted in equal measure. But with that euphoria, came a sense of sadness. Why had I stopped doing this thing that I had loved so many years ago? Instead succumbing to the mundanity of the gym.

I’m sure we all have hobbies or sports that we started when we were young and then life got in the way and consequently, they fell by the wayside. But for the ADHDer, the list can be endless. Either we forget to continue or crave a new dopamine rush, so seek out something new.

Sports that I have started over the years and abandoned include: basketball, bouldering, brazilian jiu jitsu, football, karate, kite surfing, rollerskating, skateboarding thai boxing, tennis and top trumps.

But last weekend was a reminder to do the things that bring me joy. In my last article I described how practice makes perfect and over time a beginner becomes a pro. Well who who knows what would have happened if I stuck with boxing?

In the words of Terry Malloy in the classic film On The Waterfront “I coulda been a contender”. Or at the very least, had another white collar boxing fight with Colin an IT manager from Surrey.

What hobbies or sports do you wish you hadn’t given up on? Comment below and remember it’s never too late to start again.