READING DESCRIPTIONS OF Gerritsen Beach after interviewing Heather Hardy, it comes across more like a Maine fishing village — a real life Cabot Cove but without Jessica Fletcher’s seemingly never-ending murder spree — than a Brooklyn suburb.
Front yards decorated with lawn ornaments, just one way in and out of town, and postboxes with names like Flynn, Foy and Doyle; it’s the type of place, as Hardy can verify from experience, where someone else’s mother will give you a clip around the ear and send you home if she catches you smoking as a kid.
Almost exclusively Irish Catholic – “we’re all third generation off the boat,” says Hardy — there’s a touch of Hotel California about the place. You can check out any time you like, but you never really leave.
Hardy’s family certainly haven’t, having emigrated to the area — via Scotland — in the early part of the last century as Dublin proved too small for a family of 14 kids.
Indeed, her mother has lived her whole life in same house her grandmother and great-grandmother first moved into all those decades ago.
But this isn’t just the story of any American boxer with Irish roots.
Hardy is a reminder that Eddie Hearn was wrong when he said that all other fighters were just a cheap imitation of Katie Taylor.
With two world titles and an undefeated record to her name, and fighting at a similar weight to Taylor, there’s a very real chance that any path to “breaking America” for the Bray woman goes through Hardy.
But Hardy has her own path to walk and, as far as she’s concerned, Taylor has a lot to do before theirs might intertwine.
Heather Hardy, in her tricolour shorts, celebrates yet another win. Joel Plummer / Zuma Press/PA Images
Joel Plummer / Zuma Press/PA Images / Zuma Press/PA Images
Earlier this month, the 35-year-old stepped into the ring for the 19th time as a professional when she took on Edina Kiss in Brooklyn’s Barclays Centre. And, for the 19th time, she emerged victorious.
She is the current WBC super bantamweight title and WBC featherweight title holder but only stepped into the ring for the first time at the age of 28.
“I fought about 18 months in the amateur ranks, and I won around eight titles at that level, almost every title you could win,” she told The42 this week.
“It was during the first year they were allowing women to qualify for the Olympics, in 2011. I was at 125lb, but they didn’t have my weight class so I went down to Florida and tried to compete at 132lb.
“I was standing on the scales drinking water just to make the minimum of 126lb on the scale. But I did, and I made it to the semi-finals where I lost to the girl (Mikaela Mayer) who went to the Olympics.
“I’d been boxing less than a year, but that’s when I decided to turn pro.”
The decision to turn professional was an easy one as Hardy is on record as saying she was once so poor that she couldn’t afford two eggs to make an omelette for her daughter.
And it only got worse from there.
“There was a time in my fighting career when I was actually homeless and my daughter was living with my cousins. We had nothing.
But when I started fighting, it was the first thing I was ever good at. And when I realised I was good, and how good I could be, I knew that was my way out.”
While her daughter Annie was living with relatives in Long Island, Hardy sought refuge in the gym.
Not just any old gym, one of the world’s most famous.
Throughout its illustrious existence, Gleason’s has been home to all the greats, Ali, Tyson, LaMotta, Duran… Hardy.
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Hardy working out at Gleason's in 2015. AP / Press Association Images
AP / Press Association Images / Press Association Images
“I’ve been at Gleason’s my whole career,” Hardy says.
“Growing up in Brooklyn, I knew that — if I wanted to box and make a career out of it — Gleason’s was the only place that made any sense.
“I knew that was where I was going to benefit from the experience of all the coaches who have seen so many great fighters come through and train alongside current champions.
And boxing don’t pay the bills, my personal training pays the bills and I’m at Gleason’s maybe 14 hours a day.
“It is so hard to get up and be in there at 5.3oam. I teach a lot of my clients before they go to work, so I’ll be in there from 5.30am to 9.30am and then I’m just hungry and tired but I’ve got to go run my miles and get my own gym work done, so it’s not easy.
“Any female fighter in the States will tell you that. Some of us are school teachers, receptionists, full-time parents, it’s not easy.”
It’s certainly not easy, which is one of the reasons why Hardy has been such an advocate for better treatment for boxers of her sex.
Little wonder, she’s one of the best fighters in the world and, on her last card, defended her world featherweight title before the doors of the Barclays Centre had even opened, never mind fighting on the TV portion of the card.
“I can’t complain about the media ’cause you guys are great and so many people reach out to me to try to tell my story and the story of women’s boxing.
“I can’t even say it’s so much about the promoters because, look at Lou (DiBella), he works super hard, he’s got a couple of women fighting and I’m really fortunate to have him.
“But how about the guys like Stephen Espinoza who are running Showtime Boxing and Showtime Sports, and who won’t show more than a couple of rounds of a women’s bout or sometimes none at all.
“Now, I’m not always mad because sometimes the guy fights are so good there isn’t room for me on. But when I see a pro debut or there’s a guy like 7-1 and taking a TV spot and I’m boxing at Barclays before they even open the doors, that’s beyond being just frustrating.
That’s infuriating, it’s upsetting, it makes you not want to do it any more.
“But they say boxing is like a bad girlfriend, no matter how many times they leave, you take them back.
“And I’m like that, no matter how many times I swear I’m going to tear up my gloves, I wake up the next morning and remember that I love it.
“I tell myself, it’s not my fault I’m a girl, and I love it.
“And, just like any guy who goes into the gym when they could be doing a million other things, this is what I do. This is what I’m good at.
“Don’t punish me because I’m a woman.”
Hardy is not a fan of Eddie Hearn. Niall Carson / PA Images
Niall Carson / PA Images / PA Images
Hardy does, however, have a lot of scorn for one promoter in particular.
“You’ve got a guy like Eddie Hearn who is promoting Katie (Taylor) right now, that goes into a press conference and says that all other female boxers are just a cheap imitation.
To me that’s disgusting.
“My promoter is going and saying ‘hey look, there are great female boxers and there are bad female boxers, but guess what, there are great male boxers and there are bad male boxers,’ we’re no different.
“The same way a woman working in a hospital as a surgeon is the same as a male surgeon, they’re no different.
“But then you get a guy like Eddie Hearn, who gets a microphone and whole bunch of people to listen, and I’m just like ‘come on man, there’s no need for that.’
“The idea that only one woman can be good at a time, it’s just not true. (Katie’s) talent doesn’t discredit any of mine, we can all be good. She can be talented along with other women who deserve that spotlight.
“One woman on a card. One woman on TV and I’m sorry to say it’s bullshit.
“We can all be good, we don’t all have to be fighting over the same spot.”
And speaking of fighting, is there any chance she could fight Taylor some day despite the fact they currently compete at different weights?
“Of course we could. We’re just like the guys, we go up and down in weight. I’ve boxed at 122lb and 125lb, I know Katie weighed in for one of her fights at 128lb so that makes it very likely.
“But she just started, regardless of all of her (amateur) experience and all of her talent, I have been boxing for a couple of more years than her and I have 19 fights.
“Clearly she’s going to want to get a few fights under her belt — she’s just moved to eight rounders — so I’m not counting it out.
“For all the talent these Olympic girls have, it takes an incredible adjustment to go from amateur to professional. There are smaller gloves, no headgear means a smaller target, different style of scoring so you’ve got to learn the ropes all over again.
“She’s incredibly talented and will move through the ranks, but time will tell.”
Hardy with her promoter Lou DiBella (right) and coach Devon Cormack after a win in 2016. AP / Press Association Images
AP / Press Association Images / Press Association Images
Before she hangs up her gloves, maybe even before she steps into the ring with Katie, Hardy has plans to try her hand at mixed martial arts.
They are, she says with a laugh, “hiring” at the moment.
“I’m going to keep fighting. I’ve got a hit list of girls I wanna go through before I hang up my gloves. I would like to do an MMA fight, I’m not sure where I’ll go but I’ve trained so hard, I can’t not pursue that.
“It’s a very real possibility but it would just be an addition, not a switch. I love boxing too much to switch.”
Indeed, Hardy is convinced that MMA and the success of the likes of Ronda Rousey is even more proof that some boxing promoters have got it all wrong when in comes to women fighting.
“Not only does it disprove it, it also shows that women are out there making money, they’re profitable.
“It’s not just fans but paying fans. Christy Martin said that if one ticket is sold to a sporting event, it stops being a sporting event and starts being a business.
“And boxing is a business. These promoters and the guys looking after TV cards are not being smart business men because female fighting sells.”
Hardy lands a punch against Edina Kiss earlier this month. Frank Franklin II / PA Images
Frank Franklin II / PA Images / PA Images
Fighting not only sells, but Hardy is proof it’s a path to a better life.
“I wanted my daughter to dream big dreams, to dream of doing huge things, but that’s not something that’s really promoted in a lower to working class neighbourhood,” Hardy says of Gerritsen Beach.
“I can remember my ex-husband Mike telling me to ‘stop thinking that we’re going to have a big, beautiful apartment with a balcony in a nice neighbourhood, this is where you’re from and this is who you are.’
“Now I’m 35, and I have a nice apartment with a nice balcony overlooking the river so it sure it worth having dreams.”
'To say we're all just cheap imitations of Katie... to me that's disgusting'
READING DESCRIPTIONS OF Gerritsen Beach after interviewing Heather Hardy, it comes across more like a Maine fishing village — a real life Cabot Cove but without Jessica Fletcher’s seemingly never-ending murder spree — than a Brooklyn suburb.
Front yards decorated with lawn ornaments, just one way in and out of town, and postboxes with names like Flynn, Foy and Doyle; it’s the type of place, as Hardy can verify from experience, where someone else’s mother will give you a clip around the ear and send you home if she catches you smoking as a kid.
Almost exclusively Irish Catholic – “we’re all third generation off the boat,” says Hardy — there’s a touch of Hotel California about the place. You can check out any time you like, but you never really leave.
Hardy’s family certainly haven’t, having emigrated to the area — via Scotland — in the early part of the last century as Dublin proved too small for a family of 14 kids.
Indeed, her mother has lived her whole life in same house her grandmother and great-grandmother first moved into all those decades ago.
But this isn’t just the story of any American boxer with Irish roots.
Hardy is a reminder that Eddie Hearn was wrong when he said that all other fighters were just a cheap imitation of Katie Taylor.
With two world titles and an undefeated record to her name, and fighting at a similar weight to Taylor, there’s a very real chance that any path to “breaking America” for the Bray woman goes through Hardy.
But Hardy has her own path to walk and, as far as she’s concerned, Taylor has a lot to do before theirs might intertwine.
Earlier this month, the 35-year-old stepped into the ring for the 19th time as a professional when she took on Edina Kiss in Brooklyn’s Barclays Centre. And, for the 19th time, she emerged victorious.
She is the current WBC super bantamweight title and WBC featherweight title holder but only stepped into the ring for the first time at the age of 28.
“I fought about 18 months in the amateur ranks, and I won around eight titles at that level, almost every title you could win,” she told The42 this week.
“It was during the first year they were allowing women to qualify for the Olympics, in 2011. I was at 125lb, but they didn’t have my weight class so I went down to Florida and tried to compete at 132lb.
“I was standing on the scales drinking water just to make the minimum of 126lb on the scale. But I did, and I made it to the semi-finals where I lost to the girl (Mikaela Mayer) who went to the Olympics.
“I’d been boxing less than a year, but that’s when I decided to turn pro.”
The decision to turn professional was an easy one as Hardy is on record as saying she was once so poor that she couldn’t afford two eggs to make an omelette for her daughter.
And it only got worse from there.
“There was a time in my fighting career when I was actually homeless and my daughter was living with my cousins. We had nothing.
While her daughter Annie was living with relatives in Long Island, Hardy sought refuge in the gym.
Not just any old gym, one of the world’s most famous.
Throughout its illustrious existence, Gleason’s has been home to all the greats, Ali, Tyson, LaMotta, Duran… Hardy.
“I’ve been at Gleason’s my whole career,” Hardy says.
“Growing up in Brooklyn, I knew that — if I wanted to box and make a career out of it — Gleason’s was the only place that made any sense.
“I knew that was where I was going to benefit from the experience of all the coaches who have seen so many great fighters come through and train alongside current champions.
“It is so hard to get up and be in there at 5.3oam. I teach a lot of my clients before they go to work, so I’ll be in there from 5.30am to 9.30am and then I’m just hungry and tired but I’ve got to go run my miles and get my own gym work done, so it’s not easy.
“Any female fighter in the States will tell you that. Some of us are school teachers, receptionists, full-time parents, it’s not easy.”
It’s certainly not easy, which is one of the reasons why Hardy has been such an advocate for better treatment for boxers of her sex.
Little wonder, she’s one of the best fighters in the world and, on her last card, defended her world featherweight title before the doors of the Barclays Centre had even opened, never mind fighting on the TV portion of the card.
“I can’t complain about the media ’cause you guys are great and so many people reach out to me to try to tell my story and the story of women’s boxing.
“I can’t even say it’s so much about the promoters because, look at Lou (DiBella), he works super hard, he’s got a couple of women fighting and I’m really fortunate to have him.
“But how about the guys like Stephen Espinoza who are running Showtime Boxing and Showtime Sports, and who won’t show more than a couple of rounds of a women’s bout or sometimes none at all.
“Now, I’m not always mad because sometimes the guy fights are so good there isn’t room for me on. But when I see a pro debut or there’s a guy like 7-1 and taking a TV spot and I’m boxing at Barclays before they even open the doors, that’s beyond being just frustrating.
“But they say boxing is like a bad girlfriend, no matter how many times they leave, you take them back.
“And I’m like that, no matter how many times I swear I’m going to tear up my gloves, I wake up the next morning and remember that I love it.
“I tell myself, it’s not my fault I’m a girl, and I love it.
“And, just like any guy who goes into the gym when they could be doing a million other things, this is what I do. This is what I’m good at.
“Don’t punish me because I’m a woman.”
Hardy does, however, have a lot of scorn for one promoter in particular.
“You’ve got a guy like Eddie Hearn who is promoting Katie (Taylor) right now, that goes into a press conference and says that all other female boxers are just a cheap imitation.
“My promoter is going and saying ‘hey look, there are great female boxers and there are bad female boxers, but guess what, there are great male boxers and there are bad male boxers,’ we’re no different.
“The same way a woman working in a hospital as a surgeon is the same as a male surgeon, they’re no different.
“But then you get a guy like Eddie Hearn, who gets a microphone and whole bunch of people to listen, and I’m just like ‘come on man, there’s no need for that.’
“The idea that only one woman can be good at a time, it’s just not true. (Katie’s) talent doesn’t discredit any of mine, we can all be good. She can be talented along with other women who deserve that spotlight.
“One woman on a card. One woman on TV and I’m sorry to say it’s bullshit.
“We can all be good, we don’t all have to be fighting over the same spot.”
And speaking of fighting, is there any chance she could fight Taylor some day despite the fact they currently compete at different weights?
“Of course we could. We’re just like the guys, we go up and down in weight. I’ve boxed at 122lb and 125lb, I know Katie weighed in for one of her fights at 128lb so that makes it very likely.
“But she just started, regardless of all of her (amateur) experience and all of her talent, I have been boxing for a couple of more years than her and I have 19 fights.
“Clearly she’s going to want to get a few fights under her belt — she’s just moved to eight rounders — so I’m not counting it out.
“For all the talent these Olympic girls have, it takes an incredible adjustment to go from amateur to professional. There are smaller gloves, no headgear means a smaller target, different style of scoring so you’ve got to learn the ropes all over again.
“She’s incredibly talented and will move through the ranks, but time will tell.”
Before she hangs up her gloves, maybe even before she steps into the ring with Katie, Hardy has plans to try her hand at mixed martial arts.
They are, she says with a laugh, “hiring” at the moment.
“I’m going to keep fighting. I’ve got a hit list of girls I wanna go through before I hang up my gloves. I would like to do an MMA fight, I’m not sure where I’ll go but I’ve trained so hard, I can’t not pursue that.
“It’s a very real possibility but it would just be an addition, not a switch. I love boxing too much to switch.”
Indeed, Hardy is convinced that MMA and the success of the likes of Ronda Rousey is even more proof that some boxing promoters have got it all wrong when in comes to women fighting.
“Not only does it disprove it, it also shows that women are out there making money, they’re profitable.
“It’s not just fans but paying fans. Christy Martin said that if one ticket is sold to a sporting event, it stops being a sporting event and starts being a business.
“And boxing is a business. These promoters and the guys looking after TV cards are not being smart business men because female fighting sells.”
Fighting not only sells, but Hardy is proof it’s a path to a better life.
“I wanted my daughter to dream big dreams, to dream of doing huge things, but that’s not something that’s really promoted in a lower to working class neighbourhood,” Hardy says of Gerritsen Beach.
“I can remember my ex-husband Mike telling me to ‘stop thinking that we’re going to have a big, beautiful apartment with a balcony in a nice neighbourhood, this is where you’re from and this is who you are.’
“Now I’m 35, and I have a nice apartment with a nice balcony overlooking the river so it sure it worth having dreams.”
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