PVA Hands Out Awards During Annual Banquet!

The Potomac Valley Association of USA Boxing celebrated an outstanding year by handing out awards Saturday evening during its second annual banquet at the Serengeti Art Gallery in Capitol Heights, MD.

There were a number of special awards given to the following people, groups and organizations for their support of PVA Boxing:

The District of Columbia Boxing and Wrestling Commission
District of Columbia Parks and Recreation
Cease-Fire Don't Smoke the Brothers and Sisters
Belfast-Beltway Boxing Project
Keystone Boxing

Miles Rawls, the founder of the Goodman Basketball League who co-sponsored the boxing cards in the Barry Farms section of DC.

Cassandra Ogden, the daughter of former Beltway trainer, John Sneed who passed away earlier this year.

Yours truly was honored with an award and was equally honored to serve as the guest speaker.

However, the real stars were the PVA boxers and representatives who were honored.

The Outstanding Junior boxer award went to Lawrence Malcolm of Keystone Boxing who had a tremendous year winning a number of championships including the local Golden Gloves, the Ohio State Fair and the National Silver Gloves, where he was named the Outstanding Boxer in his weight class.

The Outstanding Novice award went to Taylor Woodland of Woodland Boxing.  Woodland won the Regional Novice Golden Gloves at 132 pounds.

Gary Antuanne Russell was the recipient of the Outstanding Open Boxer.  Russell won the National Golden Gloves at 141 Pounds and became the fourth member of his family to win a national title.

The Outstanding Gym Award went to the Headbangers Gym in DC, the home of two of the area's Elite boxers -- Tiara Brown and Tyrek Irby.  Brown and Irby, along with Limelite's Malik Jackson were honored for their accomplishments.  All three are eligible to compete in Olympic-level competition.

The Outstanding Coach was Robert "Herb" Martin of Keystone Boxing, the PVA Man of the Year was Curtis Rawlings, the Outstanding Official was Jose Flores and there was a Lifetime Achievement Award given to Candy Jacobs.