Support For Marianne Marston After US Embassy Refuses Visa For Her To Fight On May 9th.

Posted on | April 29, 2009 | No Comments

Marianne ‘Golden Girl’ Marston
Team ‘USS’ Cunningham

For Immediate Release

London, UK/Philadelphia PA, USA – 14th April 2009

Philadelphia trained, British Super Bantamweight Marianne ‘Golden Girl’ Marston may still be reeling from the American authorities decision to refuse her a visa, so she can compete on the under card of Brian Cohen’s WBC Americas Light Heavyweight Title fight in South Philadelphia on 9th May 2009. However, her American training team, headed by former IBF Cruiserweight World Champion Steve ‘USS’ Cunningham; promoter Donna Cohen of ABBCorp, Inc./Bionic Bull Enterprises and her sponsor P.U.G. Athletic are all standing by her and working together on a solution.

Mike Gregory, P.U.G. Athletic’s commercial manager, made it clear that P.U.G. would continue to support Marianne as she is a strategic part of their plans to launch the brand into the American sportswear market in 2009 when he said. “We’re not going to back out of our support for Marianne. She is an extremely talented boxer and has been an excellent ambassador for P.U.G. Athletic over the past eighteen months. We are keen to continue our involvement in her career for a long time to come.

We are in discussions with Team ‘USS’ Cunningham, who represent and train Marianne in America, as well as the promoters of the May 9th event in Philadelphia, ABBCorp, Inc. and Bionic Bull Enterprises, on this matter. Marianne is contracted to them for 12 fights between now and the end of 2010, so hopefully between us we will be able to sort the visa situation out.

If a quick solution isn’t available one alternative option we are exploring, should a suitable opponent be found, Marianne debuting in the UK, or even Europe, in order to secure the ranking required to be eligible for a P1 Professional Athlete visa, rather than the B1 she had applied for on advice from the London Consulate.”

Marianne, who is still hopeful of competing next month in Philadelphia, is currently training at Gleason’s Gym near Tower Bridge, London. Should the visa problem be resolved before May, Marianne’s professional debut will be on the under card of Philadelphia’s Brian Cohen’s WBC Americas Light Heavyweight title fight on May 9th 2009 at the South Philadelphia High
School. Promoter Donna Cohen is a big supporter of Women’s boxing and every event she promotes includes at least one female match-up.

www.mariannemarston.com

For tickets and further details for the event at South Philadelphia High School please contact:

Donna Cohen
ABBCorp, Inc. & Bionic Bull Enterprise
Tel: 215 755 8155

– END –

EDITORS NOTES:

Marianne “Golden Girl” Marston

Marianne came into boxing a lot later in life than most fighters tend to, but in other ways she has been a competitive athlete and a fighter all her life.

At a young age Marianne trained at fencing (foil) by age fifteen she was seeded sixth in England (Under 16’s) and had already beaten the number one seed in competition. Marianne was selected to represent her country, but her mother decided that Marianne could not participate due to the length of time she would need to take off school.

Marianne also competed for the Norwich Penguins swimming squad.

At the age of 24, Marianne was diagnosed with advanced cervical cancer, after two years of treatment her consultant advised operating to prevent the cancer spreading. The operation was unsuccessful so one year later she underwent surgery for a second time. This time it was successful.

Marianne, who worked as a researcher for a television production company, became ill again a few years later whilst in America, at first this was thought to be food poisoning, but as the extreme pain and her drastic weight loss continued it was clear it was something more serious. After six months of tests at St Mary’s Hospital in Paddington, London, Marianne’s weight had dropped to less than 80lbs. Eventually the consultant diagnosed Marianne as suffering from a particularly severe form
of Coeliacs Disease, an autoimmune disease where the body is incapable of digesting gluten – a protein found in cereals.

It was while recovering from the serious effects of this illness that Marianne went to her local LA Fitness to get fit again. Whilst there she spoke with personal trainer, Choleton Senior, who it turned out was a former boxer until he lost a leg in a motorcycle accident. Choleton started teaching Marianne basic boxing and was impressed at her natural ability. He stepped the training up and Marianne stepped up accordingly, Choleton advised Marianne that she should find a boxing gym as he believed she had what it takes to progress in the sport.

Following his advice Marianne joined Gleason’s gym near Tower Bridge in London. She was assigned a trainer, Joe Kenwright – one of the England Amateur Boxing Team coaches. Joe was so pleased with the ability of his charge that after one of her sparring sessions, in which Marianne sent her professional opponent (a lightweight with a 13-0 record) to the canvas
twice with her lightning fast combinations, he suggested to Marianne she should look towards professional boxing in America as there were so few British female professional fighters in any class that she would not be guaranteed to obtain fights in the UK.

Whilst training at Gleason’s, John Rooney, who not only owned the gym but also P.U.G. Athletic a boxing equipment was impressed by Marianne so much that he decided to sponsor her training and equipment.

In 2007, Marianne who was already visiting America on business, New York, Boston, LA and Philadelphia, had already been training at Freddie Roach’s gym in LA and Francisco Mendez’s gym in New York when she was in those cities decided to try and find a gym in Philadelphia as she spent more time there than any other city in America. She had made an appointment to
visit Joe Hand’s gym when by accident she met legendary heavyweight world champion Smokin’ Joe Frazier who on discovering she boxed invited her to try out for him at his North Philadelphia gym.

Joe Frazier was so impressed that he asked her to be part of Team Frazier as he wanted to train her. In October Joe told Marianne that her only being able to train with his team for 4-6 weeks every couple of months was not helping her and suggested she committed herself to spending 6 months in Philadelphia so he could get her ready to turn professional.

In February 2008 Marianne made the decision to spend six months in Philadelphia, split into two three month visits, and took a lease on an apartment. Just over one month after she had done this Smokin’ Joe Frazier’s was forced to close. Marianne’s dreams were shattered as she now not only didn’t have a gym but also no management or trainers.

Eventually Marianne was advised to try out at James Shuler Memorial Gym in West Philadelphia. Marianne had found a new ‘home’ and got straight back to training for her professional debut. A date was set for August 2009 but shortly after she sustained a burst Achilles tendon and had to return to London for treatment.

On her return Marianne was invited to be part of Team ‘USS’ Cunningham by then IBF cruiserweight champion Steve ‘USS’ Cunningham and his wife/manager, Livvy and was also offered to be on the card of the January 24th 2009 Casino Battle Royale event in Atlantic City. In December this event was canceled.

Marianne, who has a twelve fight contract with Donna Cohen’s ABBCorp, Inc./Bionic Bull Enterprise, was due to debut on the under card of the Telefutura televised WBC America’s Light Heavyweight Title fight featuring Brian Cohen on 9th May 2009 at South Philadelphia.

Marianne, who flew back to London in February, was aware that she had needed to have a visa before she could compete applied firstly in March 2009 and again in April 2009. Both times her application for a B1 visa, the type of visa the London Consulate had advised her to apply for, was refused on the basis of insufficient socioeconomic ties with the United
Kingdom. The basis for this being Marianne only has two living relatives, even though both are UK resident, that she does not own or lease a property in the UK or that she does not have UK employment to return to.