Zane McNab officially retires before in ring return
Hamilton boxer Zane McNab has officially retired from professional boxing after his announcement of his in ring return this year. McNab was originally was scheduled to fight in Melbourne in a couple weeks and in Auckland in July.
His opponent in Melbourne, Darcy Boland, pulled out of the bout due to a slipped disc. As for his opponent in July, Skope Siaosi, promoters are not left scrambling to look for a new opponent due to McNab pulling out for his retirement.
McNab began his career in the Amateur back in the 90s, with the record of 18 (12 KOs) – 7 (1 KO) – 0 and winning the New Zealand National Championship and Golden Gloves Championship. McNab career finished due to his boxing gym that he trained at, closed down.
Majority of his life after that lead to hanging out with the wrong crowd, drinking, smoking and doing drugs. In 2016, McNab decide to turn his life around and to cut out all the bad stuff in his life. In mid 2016, McNab was approach by his Cousin’s Girlfriend’s brother Benjamin Watt to try out Boxing. Watt helped out best he can including paying for new gloves, photo shoot, media coverage and training sessions with people in Auckland.
McNab decided to train with his old boxing buddy, Amateur Boxing coach Jeff Stutt. As much as McNab was training hard, his fitness wasn’t up to scratch. Stutt also put dropped a bombshell on McNab, saying he will refuse to corner McNab in his pro debut due to risk of losing his coaches boxing license with Boxing NZ. Craig Thomson on request cornered McNab on less than 24 hours notice.
McNab took on Nick Hikorua on September 24th on Benjamin Watt card at ABA Stadium, however McNab lost the bout by TKO in the second round, receiving broken ribs. McNab spent the rest of the year off recovering from injuries.
In 2017, Watt Approached McNab to offer him two bouts against Darcy Boland in Melbourne on June 17th and Skope Siaosi in Auckland on July 8th. McNab agreed to the two bouts knowing he had his third baby on the way and needed the money. Watt helped out again by setting up new trainer in Auckland with John Conway, paying for a brand new passport for McNab, paying for petrol, paying for headshots for the passport, paying for food for McNab and offering a place to stay while staying in Auckland while he was training.
After everything being set up and McNab started training, Bad Luck happened. McNab had a workplace injury where a 30 kg piece of steel hit his lower back bruising his kidney. When McNab was fally recovered, he couldn’t make his gym return due to his trainers being in Wellington for Baby Nansen’s New Zealand title shot and for McNab to get food poisoning the beginning of the week after. McNab also had some trouble arriving on time for training sessions due to Baby appointments and traffic travelling from Hamilton to Auckland. With all these factors, McNabs recent training has been inconsistent.
Last week McNab had his last training session where an incident took place in the gym. McNab began with him being 40 minute late in the gym for the training session, first thing he tries is to get some days off due to his opponent being cancelled him Melbourne. That night McNab was paired up with his usual sparring partner which had gotten to a point where he could not learn anymore from this sparring partner. McNab was paired up with someone new which they have sparred before the week before, which he expressed his liking of the new person due to the new sparring partner had a height and reach advantage and was more a challenge for McNab. However this time McNab was got frustrated in this sparring session and quit halfway through the session claiming he was having trouble with his emotions.
This was disrespect for both the new sparring partner and John Conway gym. Conway decided that he will sparr with McNab instead stating that He will not hit hard, only hit correctly. Conway also stated this will be his 50% and this is the level McNab needs to be. During the Sparring session, Conway did not throw hard but all of his punches were landing and knocked down McNab 3 times over two rounds.
McNab swearing at everyone, including at Benjamin Watt when offered water and help, stormed out of the gym. Couple days after McNab and Watt had a falling out with McNab claiming that Watt planned a sparring session to knock him out and telling his friends and family that it was planned. Watt being frustrated for investing so much money into McNab and in return had a inconvenient situations.
It was agreed that McNab and Watt will take their separate paths and to have McNab to go into retirement to focus on his day job and his third child on the way. As for Skope Siaosi, his Promoter is still currently looking for an opponent for Siaosi Pro boxing debut. McNab ended his Professional career with a record of 0 – 1 (1) – 0.