If you can't ride two horses at the same time you shouldn't be in the circus.

I recently completed the Amateur Boxing Association's Boxing Tutor course. The certification affiliates me to the ABA and permits me to teach Boxing skills to adults and children. The course was in Newham, Plaistow to be accurate, which is one stop beyond West Ham on the Central Line.

The course was scheduled to begin at 8:30am which meant I needed to leave early. I had visions of a squat Phil Mitchell-like coach laying into me for poor time-keeping and consequently was up at 5:30am preparing for the day ahead.

As I stepped from my house at 6 am I carried a boiled kettle. It was an icy-cold morning and the windows of my car were frosted over. The steaming hot water made short work of the ice. Winter had truly arrived, my breath hung in the air. A cold Philadelphian morning I considered, whilst humming the Rocky theme tune.

As I drove to Streatham Common Station I wouldn't have been suprised to have seen Sylvester Stallone running up the steps of Streatham Municipal Swimming Baths trailed by a mob of kids (Probably trying to pinch the woolly hat from his head).

The first person I met on the course was a confident bloke called Danny. When I arrived at the training centre he was sharing his boxing wisdom with the customer service employee. Danny was one of those people who has done everything.

'Yeah, well I was playing professional football, quite a high standard actually- Ryman League.' He dribbled. Danny had the irritating habit of closing his eyes as he pontificated.

'That is 'til my eyes went,' he continued, pointing at his glasses, 'then I took up boxing'. I managed to make the choking on my Lucozade appear a chesty morning cough and nodded approval as I struggled to prevent the drink fizzing from my nose.

'Yeah, I had a few bouts, but had to quit as I was too old at 34'. Danny recalled, his voice filled with regret that age had cruelly denied him his legacy. I bet Tyson breathed a sigh of relief! 

I later overheard Danny telling a similar story to two different participants. The first time I heard him state that he had boxed at Middleweight (11st 6lbs). The second time I struggled to believe what I was hearing;

'Yeah, I boxed at middleweight and then at heavyweight'.

Now, there is a big difference between these weights, just less than three stone. It is possible that someone may have boxed at both weights, however, Danny's 5 foot 1 frame would struggle to get up to middleweight. Had he ever have weighed the heavyweight minimum of  14 st 4lbs he would have had to be rolled into the ring. Ladies and gentlemen, the challenger Danny 'The Meatball' Smith.

Having thought about Danny's story I have come to two feasible conclusions for his astonishing claims. Either Danny had mis-read the bathroom scales through his milk-bottle-bottomed glasses OR he had simply confused emulating Bruno Vs Bugner in his studio flat with actually fighting in a real boxing bout. Perhaps when he laid into the corduroy scatter cushions he had delusions of knocking the stuffing out of his opponent.

The course went well and I was presented with my certificate and official ABA Boxing Tutors' t-shirt. On my way out I saw Danny, I asked him how he had found the day's learning.

'Yeah, pretty good, obviously it's nothing new to me. I'm off home now to write it all up, you know, as I'm a journalist and everything.'

Finally he was making sense.

The whole experience of meeting Danny reminded me of when General Gowon of Nigeria smuggly informed Muhammed Ali,

'I used to do some boxing.'

As quick as a flash Ali retorted,

'What did you box? Apples or oranges?'