Tall fighter, big dreams

Dukus "Duke" Davis is a little brother and had to bear all the burdens that role entails.
"My brother used to hold me down and fart on my head when I was little," he says.
But then Duke was never really all that little. By the time he was 10, he weighed 189 pounds and was nearly six feet tall. He was fat and bullied because of it, he says.
Duke is now 6'7" and weighs 216 pounds. Bullies and brothers are no longer a concern. He is a boxer and has won numerous gold, silver and bronze medals at the national level. His biggest problem now is finding people willing and capable of fighting with him.
To that end he will be travelling to Ontario for two weeks this month to get some quality sparring practice so he can be ready to compete as a senior in the super heavyweight competition.
Boxing beginning
Duke made his first attempt at boxing when he was about 10, but his heart wasn't in it then.
"I got punched in the nose and didn't like it," he says.
But after three more years of bullying, he finally made the decision to stay with boxing.
He loves it now.
"For me it's just basically a way to blow off steam," he said. "I come in here and train every day and you're sweating and it just gets rid of all your emotions and frustrations. I guess it's more of a mental therapy thing the way I think of it."
As he boxed, he grew taller and thinner.
"He grew in real big spurts for about five years," said Duke's father and trainer Tom Davis. "I think it was over an inch in six months. The doctor couldn't believe it. He told him once if he kept growing at the rate he was growing - and I think he was 14 at that time - he would be eight feet tall by the time he was 20."
Searching for a sparring partner
Initially, Duke boxed in the light heavyweight division and there was a time he had a fight almost every weekend. But as his height and strength grew his competition dwindled.
"My name started getting out and people started knowing my name and no one wanted to fight anymore."
He would pour hours into training only to have his opponents pull out at the last minute.
"Once it started slowing down I started getting frustrated," he said.
Now he's lucky to find a fight every couple months.
He's learned to deal with that though and take advantage of the few fight and sparring opportunities that present themselves. But in the Maritimes those are few and often he resorts to boxing one-handed against the smaller boxers at the Westville Academy of Boxing.
That's what makes this Ontario trip so important. It will give him a chance to put into practice the skills he knows and has repeated for hours alone.
"You can't prepare with just what you're learning on the technical end of it," Tom Davis said. "We're practising all the time the different punches. He can practise them, but he can't open up and he doesn't have the same return. He needs a guy his same size returning fire that's just as dangerous as what he's going to put out. He needs that pressure and that's what he'll get up there for that two weeks."
The sparring makes an incredible difference for his confidence level as well.
"It helps me mentally so that I know what feels right and I'm not trying stuff for the first time in the middle of a fight," Duke said. "I get in the ring and get to actually try it before it actually counts, so it's more familiar."
For Duke this trip to nationals is crucial in determining what he does with the rest of his life. If he wins gold, it could mean a place on the national team and a shot at the 2012 Olympics. If he loses, it could mean he goes pro sooner or perhaps he might stay in Nova Scotia and work as a police officer while continuing to coach at the club.
But among all the uncertainty about the future, he has one fact no one can take away.
"Not too many people pick on me any more," he says with a laugh.
Who would?