With a new Attitude and Outlook, Stacey Reile eyes her Comeback

Once I started adapting to Florida I realized that I wanted to be more physically fit and just more healthy in every way. Physically and emotionally I’ve been on a mission ever since to do that. I took myself to the world class level of boxing all by myself without the support of my family. I was at Angelo Dundee’s from the first day that I ever stepped into a boxing gym. He had the entire Scandinavian camp there at the time. It was a great time and I was able to train around all of these great European fighters and I was able to learn a bunch of different styles. At the time I was around Attila Levin, who was 17-0 as well as Lenna Akesson and Kenny Lumpkin who were also undefeated. I never really looked like an amateur because I spent so much time around those people."

I later hooked up with Orlando Cuellar for a while and it was awesome. I really loved working with him. We had to eventually go our own separate ways because he is busy working with so many guys but I learned so much from training alongside Glen Johnson and Damian Frias. It was a really great, world class experience. He is so patient and he speaks so clearly and calmly in the corner. It was just so easy to listen to his instructions."

It took a lot for me to just go over to Tokyo by myself. I had one amateur fight and one pro fight and I went to Tokyo twice without a trainer. I arrived two days before the fight and it was a very small, hard ring. I do remember that the people were very nice. That was very comforting and it was very fair for me going over there. I was still a lot more comfortable after I won."

I’m very versatile. I can jab, I can box, and I can punch. I throw punches from all angles and I have power in both hands. I am ambidextrous. I write with my left hand but I box righty. People never know what to expect with me and that’s why I have no problems with opponents watching film of me because they can watch them all they want but I adapt to whatever style is in front of me."

I learned that you can’t always believe what you read online or what is told to you. I would have been the first person to read something on the internet and just assume it was the truth but that’s not always the case. When you have a promoter and you have a team they want to paint a picture of their fighter and it’s not always the right image. I didn’t realize that until I actually had it happen to me. It’s a very dirty business and they can try to get you at every way. Even the ranking systems are all mixed up but I do love my WBC ranking."

It’s going to be a good comeback fight for me and I’m really looking forward to it. I’ve been training really hard for the past eight months and I have a little more attitude since my last fight in Germany. I’m ready to go out there and show the world what I’m made of. After having your first loss and having to come back from that it gives you a little more hunger."

My trainer Jorge Rubio and I have been together since after my first pro fight. We have a really big connection. I remember the day that I was out in Miami getting my wings tattooed on my hip, his mother actually passed away on the same exact day. I wasn’t supposed to be at the gym on that day but when I was driving to the gym to show people my new tattoo from Miami Ink I looked over and saw Jorge in the car next to me. I was very happy but when I looked at him he was extremely sad and it was very ironic. He told me that his mom passed away in Cuba and he told me he wanted her portrait tattooed on him so that she would be with him forever. I ran it by the people at Miami Ink and it was actually featured on the show. Kat Von D was actually the one who did it. That story is just a small part of our bond."

Around March I found out about the fight but Coach Rubio was unaware that he needed the invitation letter in time if he was going to be able to go overseas. It was no fault of his own because he was unaware that he needed the letter. The Germans never sent it and they kept making it like they were going to send it but they never did. I think they never had the intention of sending it. Not having him there was hard on me. It was tough not having him there. He brings the fire out in me. He’s a great trainer and he has a lot of great fighters. He’s the best on the pads and this guy who I had over there with me just didn’t know how to bring me out. He didn’t know how to train properly and he didn’t give me the correct directions in the corner. He didn’t give me any support after I was hit in the ear. It was my own fault but I thought he was more experienced."

I’ve fought quite a few times without a top trainer and it was inexperience on my part thinking I could go into a world class situation and hostile territory without a trainer or without a corner. They used every conceivable angle to defeat me. They outsmarted me. It was pretty stressful being over there for over a week without my proper trainer. I never even got a piece of ice for the back of my head after I was hit in the ear."

In my eyes and everyone else’s eyes I won those first three rounds. The photographers never showed any pictures of me in control, they only showed pictures of her landing punches in the fourth round, after my ear drum was ruptured. The judges said that I lost three rounds and they made it look like the referee had to hold me up after the punch but the reason he did that was because it was after the bell. If I wouldn’t have been hit after the bell the fight would have been completely different but people acted like they didn’t even see it happen."

I was doing well. I was being conservative and being cautious. I was much faster than her and I remember that I didn’t wear a waist guard because they told me she didn’t throw anything to the body. I remember specifically when she started throwing jabs to the body that it really didn’t matter because she didn’t have much of a punch anyways. Her thing is that she aims for these points, such as the ear, and whatever. She did know how to place her punches very well and she was very agile. She’s good on her feet but in my eyes I won those first three rounds and I was just getting warmed up. She couldn’t hurt me and that’s why she had to hit me in the ear."

I was warned before I went over there that I shouldn’t go down because they would be afraid that the referee would stop the fight. That happened to another female fighter before me. I’d never been hurt before in a fight and I didn’t know what it was like to be hit in the ear. I didn’t even know that fighters did that. I tried to backpedal the next round. I was on my feet, and I wasn’t hurt or beaten and I was only 20 seconds away from making it til’ the end of the round. My own corner stopped the fight from behind my back. He waited until I rose before he stopped the fight. My own father told me that if he thought I was in trouble for one second, he would have jumped in and stopped it himself."

Afterwards I was definitely crushed. It was hard because a lot of people came out of the woodwork and had this plot against me like I wasn’t talented and that I got knocked out. I wasn’t knocked out yet they tried to act like I was a terrible fighter or an amateur fighter. They acted like they didn’t see the ear punch. They acted liked they didn’t see that I won the first three rounds. They really portrayed the wrong picture and to this day they are still talking about it."

I originally had plans of being undefeated champion but that kind of went out the window in Germany. But the main thing is that the loss didn’t break me. To this day I know that I was only defeated, I wasn’t beaten. I still am very determined to become champion and I wont let anything deter me from my goal."

For More on Stacy Reile, please pay her a visit at www.MySpace.com/staylo4real