Rosie Eccles says the success of fellow Welsh boxer Lauren Price can help inspire her own Olympic ambitions in Paris next summer.
The 26-year-old, who won light-middleweight gold at the 2022 Commonwealth Games in Birmingham, is one of 13 British boxers chosen to compete at the European Games in Poland where she will have an opportunity to qualify for the 2024 Paris Olympics.
Eccles hopes to emulate the success of former sparring partner Price, who became the first Welsh fighter to win Olympic boxing gold in Tokyo in 2021 and has since turned professional, recently beating Kirstie Bavington in the inaugural British Female Welterweight Championship contest in Birmingham.
“Before our time with GB we were with Wales together, she’s about two or three years older than me so she’s always moved up that bit quicker,” said Eccles.
“She was on the Welsh Commonwealth team just before me, so we’ve been around each other for a long time.
“To see her go and achieve her dream was brilliant, I was incredibly happy for her. We’re still around each other, we often stay at the same house and we are in the gym together, so not a lot has changed but she’s gone on to a different game in boxing really. We still spar and still train alongside each other.
“When I was eight, I dreamed of being an Olympian. I thought it would be in running or swimming but then I found boxing and eight years later, at the age of 16 and for the past decade, it has been my focus to reignite the dream I had as a kid. To finally go out and try and secure it is everything really.”
Tokyo heartbreak
Eccles helped Price prepare for Tokyo after missing out herself, due to a combination of illness and Covid disruption to the qualifying process.
Having lost her March 2020 qualifying bout in London just as coronavirus spread across the UK, Eccles was denied the chance to box again after the event was postponed.
Prior to that, she contracted a virus that attacked nerves on the right side of her body and temporarily lost the function of her arm.
“I was one of the early people to get Covid at the start of 2020 before people really knew what it was,” added Eccles.
“I then woke up with a pain in my neck four weeks before the [first] qualifier which progressed quite seriously. By the time of the qualifier I got through it, it’s amazing what your body can do when you have to do something, but then it continued to get worse and I lost about 80% of function of my right side and couldn’t get dressed.
“I thought it was career-ending but luckily we found out what it was and got on the right track and came back for 2021. I was just about to go to the second qualifier and was performing very well and then it was cancelled, so my dream was over.
“I beat the Russian I had lost to in the first qualifier and had beaten five Olympians that year but I wasn’t at the Olympics, so it was a tough pill to swallow but I think I have taken something from it.
“At the time it didn’t feel there was anything to be taken from that but I’m a lot smarter and maybe it just wasn’t meant to be. Hopefully this is my time.”
Flying flag at Commonwealths
A lot has changed for Eccles since the disappointment of Tokyo. After her Commonwealth triumph, she was chosen as a flag bearer for the closing ceremony in Birmingham, and last month she won a Grand Prix event as a welterweight in the Czech Republic after she beat USA’s Morelle McCain.
“The Grand Prix was a big tournament. I had four fights in four days out there, I beat the current European champion [Germany’s Stefanie von Berge] which was a good marker, beat American, Ukrainian and Brazilian fighters as well, so it was tough, you don’t often box four times in four days,” said Eccles.
“It was my first tournament since an operation at the end of last year so it was a good benchmark to see where I’m at.
“Winning Commonwealth gold was an incredibly proud moment for me for many reasons. I have always had the Olympic dream but that Commonwealth gold has also been there alongside it. There’s something really special about Team Wales, the relationships I have are things you can’t buy.
“It was just incredible to stand on the podium and I have my national anthem play with my team around me. It will stay with me for life having my family there too but have got to park that for now.
“The Olympics is the reason I began boxing and has kept me on a really good path from the age of 16 and changed my life, the cog that changed everything, and I’m very much ready to fulfil that promise I made myself at 16 years old.”
