Former boxer Stephen Lovett found writing was just the therapy he needed to cope with not just his retirement from boxing, but the mental hurdles he had been faced with in his relentless pursuit for victory, reports KATARINA LLOYD JONES.

Most athletes don’t win, and no matter how hard they train, there comes a time where they have to walk away from the thing they love most.

Knowing this doesn’t make it any easier though, and for Cowra-born former professional boxer Stephen Lovett he found writing was just the therapy he needed to cope with not just his retirement from boxing, but the mental hurdles he had been faced with in his relentless pursuit for victory.

“Physically, I thought I had it. I had everything,” he says.

“Mentally, I struggled. I struggled with the mental side of boxing… to get the confidence.

“Boxing gave me confidence, but then took the confidence.”

Stephen’s book – Tough Is Not Enough – delves into this paradox that came to define his boxing career, and the addictive nature of chasing a win. But, it also acknowledges the strength in walking away, and coming out the other side from such an intense “obsession”.

After spending decades training but never quite getting to where he wanted professionally, the 39-year-old Tuggeranong-based stonemason says writing his novel was an opportunity to let go of all the passion and love, but also all the frustration he felt towards the sport.

He says he originally got into boxing when he was 13, through his grandfather, who one day showed him a series of old videotapes of heavyweight boxing games.

“From that day, from when I was 13 years old, I was obsessed, that’s all I wanted to do, I was so hooked on it after watching these videotapes,” he says.

Stephen says he asked his mum if he could start training, so she took him to the shop to buy a punching bag, which his grandfather hung on an old swing set. 

“Every afternoon after school I’d be out there punching the bag, watching the videotapes and then punching the bag,” he says. 

“That was my life for a long time, I wasn’t focused in school, it was boxing.”

Despite his total dedication to the sport, there was nowhere for him to actually compete in Cowra.

Eventually, Stephen says his dad found him a coach in nearby Canowindra, who was able to take him to competitions. 

The long-awaited fight ended up a disaster, with Stephen falling ill with food poisoning the day before and losing the match.

So began his complicated relationship with the sport. 

“It was intimidating, boxing, I was scared of getting in the ring, but I loved doing it. 

“I was boxing in the amateurs and I won an Australian amateur title, I was a scholarship holder at the Australian Institute of Sport, and I always wanted to take it further, but I didn’t think of the future. 

“Then, I lost the Commonwealth Games selection fights and that’s where I said to my dad: ‘I think I want to turn professional,’ and that was 2010.

“And from that day, my whole life was dedicated to boxing. That was it. That’s what I was going to do.”

He travelled to Houston, in the US, where he was based for five years under the guidance of Ronnie Shields, but still could not crack the big time.

After years of cancelled or delayed fights, Stephen was finally given an opportunity to fight, and his win promised the success he had spent decades training for.

But he lost, and he says even his coach recommended he should retire.

“It was really hard. Mentally, it took a toll on me,” he says. 

“I really found it hard to let it go, even though throughout the 20 plus years I did it, I dealt with a lot of depression and anxiety because of boxing.

“The pressure I put on myself because I didn’t want to disappoint other people, I didn’t want to disappoint boxing coaches or sponsorship.”

He says after this loss he felt as though he had nowhere to go, and so, he started writing, in the hopes it would give him, and others, closure.

“I had one more fight after that loss, […] at the Hellenic Club in Woden,” he says.

“I won that fight, and that was the last fight I had. 

“It wasn’t a spectacle, it was with a guy with more losses than wins, but for me to get in a boxing ring, that’s the achievement for me. 

“To overcome all those fears and all those doubts that I have, for me to step in that ring, I was over the moon when I won that fight.”

Tough Is Not Enough, available in early October at simonandschuster.com.au.