Editors note: This is an extended version of a story from our Dec. 14 edition's Food section.
“Punch him in the head, Kate!”
Kate Garrett is decked out in pink — pink sports bra, pink spandex, pink scrunchie and pink boxing gloves. She’s at least 20 pounds lighter and 2 inches shorter than the teenager she’s sparring with, although she’s about twice his age.
“Don’t wait for him, Kate,” her coach calls from the corner.
Her opponent lands some jabs and Kate’s head snaps back. She quickly puts her hands up and throws shots back.
“That’s it, Kate, one, two, one two,” another coach calls from the opposite corner.
It’s Garrett’s sixth week of boxing training. She started at Lilac City Boxing Club on Sept. 24, three months before the inaugural Bartenders Brawl. The amateur boxing event at the Knitting Factory on Dec. 21 is organized by boxing coach Danny Thomas, who's also a bartender and bouncer at Monterey Cafe on north Washington Street.
Garrett is a bartender at Whiskey Glasses in Chattaroy and D-Mac’s on the Lake in Hauser, Idaho, plus a mom to four kids. She’s grew up as a gymnast and softball player, and started boxing with no experience in contact sports. She’s now six-and-a-half weeks away from her first fight, where she’ll spar in front of family, friends, coworkers and a host of other food industry workers. It’s the first boxing event at the downtown rock concert venue for at least a decade.
Technically, you don’t have to be a bartender to participate in Bartenders Brawl. Anyone in the food industry is welcome as long as they sign up with enough time to train and register with USA Boxing. Plus, some amateur boxers from local clubs will join the brawl, too, to fill out the roster.
To Thomas, who dreamed up the crossover event, the theme is just a way to introduce new people to the sport. Bartender boxing events happen in Australia and New Zealand, he says, and he’s hoping it becomes an annual or biannual event in Spokane, too.
(FYI: Thomas isn’t limiting the idea to the food scene — he’s already got barbers interested in a barbershop brawl. Plus, he’s happy to organize an event for anyone who wants to get in the ring, regardless if it’s alliterative or not.)
BZZT! BZZT! BZZT!
The timer goes off, as it does every 30 seconds, but always with the urgency and pitch of a fire alarm. The group of boxers drops for a round of push ups. When the timer goes off again, they pop back up for footwork.
Ray Kerwick watches the group as they move through their workout. It’ll be two hours of almost nonstop movement, 26 rounds in all. Kerwick has trained everyone from pre-teens to Olympic team boxers and this workout hasn’t let him down yet.
Kerwick is the head boxing coach at Lilac City Boxing Club, an amateur, nonprofit boxing gym that he and Thomas started together in 2022. Kerwick is tall and lightweight, with perfect posture and a graying beard. He calls out quick commands and encouragement to his fighters, but talks gently in conversation, leaving space before he speaks. Kerwick is revered in the local boxing scene for his deep experience and selfless approach to coaching.
“He’s one of the very few people in the sport who don’t want a financial reward,” Thomas says. “I’ve never even once seen him hint at paying ourselves.”
Kerwick is one of two coaches getting Garrett into shape for her match come December. Garrett trains with him at Lilac Boxing on Mondays and Tuesdays, and then with respected coach and Hauser local Ryan Jeffries on Saturdays.
Tonight, Kerwick puts on hand mitts to work with Garrett one-on-one.
“Think about your stance,” he says, pointing to the black tape on the linoleum floor. Garrett rearranges her feet until Kerwick is satisfied. They go through the motions, slowly, of blocking a headshot and immediately punching back. As Garrett gets more comfortable, she moves more quickly, striking every time Kerwick tries to push her back.
“It's nothing [like anything] I’ve really ever done,” Garrett says. “The hardest thing about it all is doing all your skills at once. You have to block, you have to hit, you have to have your feet in the right position. So you have to memorize all these things.”
Garrett grew up with three brothers, roughhousing and playing sports for most of her childhood. Now a mother of four with two bartending jobs, most of her energy is spent taking care of others. Constant stress takes a toll.
“I struggle with anxiety and depression,” Garrett says. “It's been tough. You get stuck in the rut of life. And you're like, How do I get started?”
According to the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration, a branch of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, the restaurant and hospitality industry has some of the highest levels of drug use and depression of any industry. High levels of physical and mental stress build, and without healthy release valves, they can lead to addictions or burnout.
“I needed a sport. I needed activity,” Garret says. “I was previously talking to my boyfriend about this — I want to do boxing, or I want to do karate. I need an outlet. So when [a DJ at Whiskey Glasses] brought up doing this boxing thing, I was like, ‘Heck, yeah!’ The next day, I talked to my boss from D-Mac’s, and he's like, ‘I know a personal trainer.’ I was boxing a half week later.”
Garrett definitely found the workout she was hoping for. But what she didn’t expect was the community that Kerwick and Jeffries built at their gyms. Far from an individual competition, boxing is a team sport, Garrett insists. Sure, you’re one-on-one with your opponent in the ring for a few minutes, but the rest of the time you’re training as a group, taking pointers from one another, asking for help and hyping each other up.
“Good job tonight, Kate,” a boxer calls to Garrett before heading out the door. He’s from another club but came to Lilac City Boxing tonight to spar, and most everyone in the amateur boxing world knows each other.
“You gotta breathe when you punch,” he reminds her.
“I know, I’m learning breathing,” she says.
“You’re holding your breath the whole time,” he says.
“I've been working on breathing through my nose and then breathing out because I didn't do that before.”
“Go like, shh, shh, like you're shushing someone to sleep.” He forces quick bursts of air from between his teeth as he shadowboxes the air. “Shh, shh, putting them to sleep with your fist.”
Garrett quickly earned the respect and admiration of the group she trains with, which is mostly boys from 10 to 20 years old. She’s a mother figure and cheerleader during the workouts, but in the ring, she’s ready to compete. When a 10-year-old boy told her he was concerned about sparring because he wasn’t allowed to hit girls, Garrett promptly responded that at the gym, she wasn’t a girl, she was a boxer.
“Being a bartender, you have to have a certain personality,” she says. “I have a spicy personality. I have a sassy personality. So this is fun for me.”
She’s not afraid to give a teenager a bloody nose. And she’s not afraid to take a hit, either. The week before, she sparred a woman 50 pounds heavier with plenty more experience. Garrett went home with a black eye.
“It shocked me, but I learned from it,” Garrett says. “It was good for me. So it's a lot of fun. And it's something new — it’s not just for guys.”
Thomas agrees. The assistant coach at Lilac City Boxing is sick of seeing young men saunter into the gym with something hyper-masculine to prove.
“A lot of guys will come in because they want to be tough and they want to beat up on people,” Thomas says. “They don't know how to check their ego at the door. They're gonna weed themselves out, because they're not there for the right reasons. Women are the best students you can have. If a woman starts boxing, she's gonna stick with it. You can give me 10 people and one of them will be a woman — that woman will most likely make it the longest, from my experience over the last 15 years. I think women are the future of boxing.”
But the future isn't here yet.
Now, just two and a half weeks before the brawl, Garrett still doesn’t know who she’ll fight come Dec. 21. No other novice female fighters at 120 pounds have registered. But that doesn’t mean Garrett has slowed her training at all— in fact, she’s upped her training to four times a week, with cardio on the other three days.
This week, as she’s working hand mitts with Coach Jeffries, she throws jabs with way more force, speed and precision than a month ago.
“Two more,” Jeffries coaxes her. “Fast, fast!”
Garrett stops herself if her stance is wrong, then starts the combo over again. Her back leg twists with every punch, thrusting momentum forward from her hips through her outstretched arm. She forces Jeffries backwards with each hit.
“I've had a hard day so maybe I was hitting hard because of that,” Garrett says. “But I'm finally getting the feel. Instead of going like that” — she throws a bad punch that looks like she’s pawing the air I'm actually connecting,” slamming her fist into her palm with a satisfying smack.
Garrett will be in the ring on December 21 no matter what, Kerwick says. If they can’t find a suitable, safe opponent, Garrett could spar in an exhibition bout, which is less about competition and more about showcasing skills. But Garrett is optimistic that at least one other girl in a local amateur club will end up registering for the brawl. Her only other worry? That her contacts will fall out during the fight. It's happened twice in training so far, and Garrett's added eye drops to her work out bag in case of emergency.
Other than that, she's excited to compete. When she steps into the ring, everything in her head goes silent. Sometimes she even blocks out her coaches. When the match starts, it's just her, her training, and pure adrenaline.
But in case she needs extra hype, Garrett’s cheer squad is already in place. She’s making black sweatshirts and pink T-shirts with “Sassy,” her nickname, across the back, plus D-Mac’s logo on the front. Even some long-time regulars are coming to see her fight.
“We already have two VIP booths on ringside seats, eight people at least all cheering me on,” she says. “That’s what makes me excited. Doesn't matter if I lose. They’re gonna have fun watching me get beat up, or they’re gonna have fun watching me do really good.”
Bartenders Brawl • Thu, Dec 21 at 6 pm • $25-$150 • 21+ • The Knitting Factory • 919 W. Sprague Ave. • sp.knittingfactory.com • 509-244-3279
