Express & Star

Sky's the limit for Lucy Caldicott

Wolverhampton teenager Lucy Caldicott is flying high after winning a top boxing honour.

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Lucy, aged 19, found it a smooth journey from development boxing to the elite class when she stepped up at the recent Winter Women's Box Cup open tournament in Wigan,

The Wolverhampton Boxing Club member - who makes aeroplane parts in her day job at Collins Aerospace - certainly wasn't winging it, beating opponent Zaffran Jami on a unanimous decision at Leigh Leisure Centre.

Fighting in the Elite Class C Under 50kg category, she dropped 16kg in intense training between March and September to make the weight.

Lucy was one of a team of 16 females from Birmingham based Fight Like a Girl (FLAG) who went to Wigan for the open tournament which can see fighters pitted against any opponent from around the country - the team itself got four golds, six silver and four bronze medals.

Lucy has a training session once a month with the club, which gives women the chance to take part in the sport and box competitively.

She also trains at the Wolverhampton club in the week under her father Lee and coaches Mick and Joe Thornton and helps supervise and train other female fighters there.

After starting out practicing karate, she took up boxing nine years ago and won three gold medals and three Midlands titles at development level before progressing to the elite.

Lee said: "We are all very proud of her, she trained hard for the competition, including having to drop a quite considerable amount of weight from last year to make the category.

"The work done with her at Wolverhampton Boxing Club has been great as well as the help given by FLAG which is exclusively female and the training there is very intense and stringent which helps with fitness and preparing for tournaments. Lucy had made such good progress with them they invited her to the elite tournament in Wigan which was a step up in class but she excelled.

"We are waiting to hear what is next, perhaps a call from the Elite Sports Academy at Sheffield because she has been inspired by this and by the success of the likes of Katie Taylor who has become a household name and has really paved the way for other women like Lucy to follow."