October 2024 | Vol. 34 Iss. 10
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FROM STRUGGLE TO STRENGTH: HOW MILO GUTIERREZ FOUND HIS WAY By Peri Kinder | peri.k@thecityjournals.coom
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Milo Gutierrez (second from left) after a 2018 boxing match with his father Rene Gutierrez (left) and his coaches Ted Gurule and Nick Butterfield (far right). (Photo courtesy Milo Gutierrez)
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Visiting astronaut
ilo Gutierrez was a young man on his way to trouble. Growing up in Herriman, he got in fights at school, was suspended, expelled and even went to jail twice. But at 20 years old, after battling his own demons, Gutierrez found a new path through boxing. When he was released from jail the second time, his brother-in-law took him to the Fullmer Brothers Boxing Gym where he met Gene Fullmer, a World Middleweight boxing champion. On his very first day, Fullmer put Gutierrez in a sparring match. It didn’t go well. “I literally only lasted one round,” he said. “I was so gassed. I remember I was wearing a white T-shirt and it was all bloody. My mom’s like, ‘You’re still getting in trouble? I knew you wouldn’t change.’ And I said, ‘No, mom. I started boxing.’” That was 10 years ago. Now, at 30, Gutierrez is a three-time Golden Gloves state champion (2016, 2017, 2018), a two-time Golden Gloves regional champion (2017, 2018) and was ranked sixth in the nation. Although he retired from competitive boxing, Gutierrez is now training the next generation of fighters at his gym, Deorum Boxing in Bluffdale (2796 W. 14000 South).
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Gutierrez worked as a personal trainer before renting a 400-square-foot space where he started his first boxing gym. He moved to Butterfield Park in Herriman for a few months to continue training his boxers before he and his wife, Alejandra, bought a house in Riverton and converted the garage to a boxing gym in October 2021. “Within a year and a half, I probably had about 50 students in the gym. And I just didn’t want to be that neighbor,” he said. “Everybody was cool with it and we had the permit from the city, they loved the idea of Continued page 4
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