Brooklyn boxer Sebastian Mazeneth has been training hard for the last two years, hitting the gym every day.
He is now ranked 11th (tied with four others) on a national list of elite amateur boxers, according to his trainer, and has his sight set on qualifying for the USA Boxing National Championship in December.
The 21-year-old from Bay Ridge won a silver medal at the USA Boxing Summer Festival in Wichita, Kansas, defeating three boxers back-to-back before losing to a more experienced competitor.
Mazeneth said he largely owes his tough attitude to his Brooklyn upbringing. "Brooklyn taught me a lot," he said. "It made me gritty, it made me hungry."
With 2.7 million people living the borough, you have to work hard to stand out, he said. The Brooklyn attitude is "never giving up, and always pushing forward," he said.
"You're in an environment where you see the real deal of what life really is. You see people struggling, you see people doing well for themselves. You see which paths you could go down, and it's all up to you to decide what you want to make of yourself," Mazeneth said.
Mazeneth moved to the Bay Ridge neighborhood of Brooklyn at the age of seven, after spending his early years in Barranquilla, Colombia. He grew up with a single mother, another life lesson that taught him about resilience.
When he's not boxing, he's busy getting his degree in finance from the College of Staten Island, part of the City University of New York.
Mazeneth will be competing in the Metropolitan Championships from September 28 to November 2. With good results, this would help him qualify him for the USA Boxing National Championships later this year, he said.
