The noise of gloves hitting punching bags no longer resonates in the room of the Boxing Club of Vigneux-sur-Seine, avenue Henri-Barbusse.
“For two years, because of the Covid, the club has been asleep,” summarizes Pasquale Mancini, 63, including nearly forty spent within this Essonnian structure.
Despite this forced sleep, nothing could shake this sports institution of the city, 45 years of existence this year. The foundations are solid. Pasquale Mancini is one of the load-bearing walls, and not only thanks to his broad build. "It is the soul and the locomotive of this club", greets Omar Hamlat, the president of BC Vigneux.
Because Pasquale Mancini has known everything.
From small cramped premises at the foot of a tower in the Croix-Blanche district to today's family club which, before the health crisis, had up to 160 licensees.
He remembers the beginnings, at the dawn of the 1980s, when he boxed with his brother Luigi.
“We had a very small room the size of a ring, an office in a hallway.
A shower, a toilet, and that's it!
»Remembers the 60-year-old.
At the time, Delphine was already accompanying her dad to training.
“I took her when she was 3 or 4 years old.
It was a daycare for her because my wife was working.
"
Delphine showed the way to other boxers
The little girl keeps herself busy by drawing or playing with a pair of gloves.
It was not until 2000 that she took her first steps in a ring, in the current premises of BC Vigneux, the old dojo of the city.
“I was already doing judo and football, but it wasn't really my thing,” smiles Delphine.
Pasquale immediately detects his talent.
“It showed in his agility, his way of moving, his glance.
His is also sharp.
Since Delphine will thread the victories like the hooks.
She compiled a total of ten titles of champion of France, including eight in senior.
Having gone professional, in April she won her first fight in Belgium, against a Serbian.
Vigneux-sur-Seine.
The Boxing Club had up to 160 licensees before the health crisis.
LP / Romain Chiron
It embodies the success of the BC Vigneux training. Like her, many champions grew up on the rings of the city. This is the case of the former double world champion Jean-Baptiste Mendy, who died last September from cancer.
The young woman, soon 34 years old, gave ambition to the other girls of the club.
“At the start, she was the only one to box in competition.
As Delphine was put forward, it relieved the others who got down to it afterwards ”, underlines Pasquale.
The ambition of the French champion, who trains 10-14 year olds, is precisely to bring more girls to competition.
“The fact that it's a man's world can block some of them.
The transition to competition is a more violent mental course that not all of them cross, ”believes the one who is also a sports educator in the city's schools.
“Pasquale is an institution!
"
In any case, his mental strength and his track record amaze the former club members. “I saw this little 5-year-old cabbage hanging out in the room. And today, she is ten times champion of France… It's crazy ”, incenses Mustapha, says Mouss. This former BC Vigneux also owes a lot to Pasquale Mancini, his trainer at the time. “I joined the club in the 1990s, it goes back a long way! Pasquale is my boxer grandpa. He saved quite a few young people from prison, by preventing us from doing bullshit. Since he was from the neighborhood, nothing could be hidden from him. He made us whip, work hard. He has coached several generations of young people, the city should give him a medal for that. The guy, this is an institution! "
Mouss, now 50, signed his 12-year-old son to the club, "when I saw he was starting to go around in circles," he says.
Omar Hamlat, he rents this double hat of trainer and educator that Pasquale wears.
“It transmits the values of rigor, respect for rules, fighting spirit, which young people transpose into their daily lives.
Boxing plays a real social role.
"
The town hall wants to invest in larger premises
Pasquale and Delphine will continue to support the development of BC Vigneux.
The municipality plans to rebuild the current premises to enlarge the surface.
“It's a building dating from the 1930s, which is too small, there are not enough rings.
The idea is to have a larger space for the development of the club, which has obtained excellent sporting results, ”explains Thomas Chazal, mayor (LR) of the town.
In the meantime, the licensees will box at the Maurice-Baquet gymnasium.
Still spearheading Delphine Mancini, who sets high goals for herself.
Fight in the European Championship, then in the World Championship in his category, with his father by his side.
“I wouldn't see myself being coached by someone other than him,” says Delphine.
It has never been complicated between us.
"