Born the in the United States of immigrant parents from Colombia, Patricia Alcivar and her three sisters did not begin life living the American dream. Though her trials were often horrific, Patricia was and is a fighter. Her story is not one of horror and pain, but of hope and promise. She lived through what many could never imagine yet too many must endure. In the true style of a Rocky story however, she is not a victim … She is the victor. And to the victorious go the spoils.

Her earliest memories of her alcoholic father are of him sexually molesting her; that is when he wasn’t yelling at her or beating her up to keep her from revealing the truth. Caught up in a web of lies, cruelty and deception, she somehow found the will to continue. Unfortunately her mother was of no help to Patricia.

“She never believed me,” recalls Patricia. “Even when she walked in the room while it was happening. That was even worse than the abuse.”

At the age of 12 things changed. Finally strong and mature enough to understand that this was wrong, Patricia found a courage she didn’t know she had to protect her younger sister from the same fate by calling the police.

“One afternoon my father started playing hide and go seek with us girls,” she says. “He made us all hide and run away from him and then locked my younger sister in the room with him. That was the last straw. I can’t explain what came over me. I was furious yet I had total clarity. I refused to let the same fate befall my sister. That’s when I called the police.”

She shocked her family by making that call but she doesn’t regret it.

“My mother probably still doesn't forgive me to this day,” she says. “She didn’t press charges but he left anyway. He moved out and we never saw him again.”

Her mother resented Patricia for causing him to leave. She took her anger out on Patricia by repeating over and over that Patricia would never amount to anything.

“I still remember being 13 and watching the Los Angeles Marathon,” she says. “I saw how Olga Markova, a Russian runner, was being cheered on and applauded. It was so wonderful to watch people cheering for someone like that. I turned to my mother and said that I was going to run a marathon some day and be just like Olga. She scoffed at me and repeated her usual mantra that I would never be a good runner or amount to anything.”

The very next day, Patricia awoke at 5:00 AM and started running.

“I was 13 years old and ran 10 New York City blocks,” she says. “I came back winded but exhilarated. I haven’t stopped since.”

Patricia found freedom and a challenge to focus on in running.

“I was so excited by the good feelings that, I took up the martial art Kyokushin, which is a Japanese form of full contact Karate,” she recalls. “Of course I needed money to be able to do these things so I started delivering the daily newspaper.”

Her first paycheck brought with it a taste of freedom and independence.

“It was $79 dollars,” she says. “And I was so proud of myself. I went and spent it all. I bought my sneakers for running, I joined for karate lessons and I went to the movies and got stuffed on popcorn and pizza.”

After her celebration she got back to work. She trained herself in the early days, building her stamina on Queens Boulevard in New York. Patricia started by running one block further each week. By the end of that year, she was running the entire boulevard back and forth for a total of six miles. At 14 she entered her first race.

“It was a 5K and I was already running six miles a day, so it was easy,” she says. “I won in my age class but the win was bittersweet. It was my first taste of competition, and I loved it. To hear and see the crowd cheering for me as I crossed the finish line was fantastic. I even won a trophy but, I was alone when I received it. Nobody in my family came to watch me or support me. Even when I brought it home, my mom didn’t even make mention of it. It was like nothing ever happened.”

At the age of 16, she entered her first marathon, the NYC Marathon. It took getting special permission to compete because she was underage. She ran in nine consecutive marathons after that.

Meanwhile, she was still training in full contact Kyokusin. In 1994, she entered and won World Championship in the lightweight division held in New York City. After reaching the pinnacle of that sport, she turned her sites to boxing.



“It’s
really a funny story how I found my trainer,” she says. “He eventually helped me to get a national amateur title but it took a bit of convincing on my part. I took a boxing class at a local gym and after my first day, I went up to the instructor who was 6 feet, 5 inches tall and weighted 240 pounds. I told him that this felt like aerobics, not boxing. I told him that I wanted to hit someone like I did in Karate. I can still recall the look on his face when he told me laughingly that Karate was not a sport. I got visibly upset and he said he would prove it to me."

That's when he told Patricia to put some moves on him so she could see what he meant.

“I took it as a challenge and started with some kicks and punches. He blocked every last one of them. That only made me madder. That’s when I really turned it on and found the right spot in his mid-section. I saw an opening and landed a straight punch. He went down. Half grimacing and half smiling he decided that he would take me on and train me personally.”

Train her he did. After months of work, she was ready for her first fight.

“It was like a scene from a bad movie,” she says. “I was fighting a lady that had just come out of jail. She had a scar from her cheekbone to her lip. All I remember was her last name: Barbosa. She went into the ring first, and I came in second. You should have heard the gasp from crowds at Madison Square Garden. We were the preliminary fight for the Golden Glove competition so the place was packed.

“I have always looked much younger than I really am. But that day my baby face got me more attention that I ever imagined. The crowd was literally screaming for me not to fight the 'Scary Girl' in the ring. I kept hearing the people from the crowd say things like, ‘Oh my, somebody save this little girl.’ And, ‘Don’t let her get in the ring with HER.’ They were scared for me.

"The funniest part of the story is that I knocked her down several times for eight counts in the first round. The crowd was insane. They were screaming for me. I instantly became the crowd’s sweetheart.”

They stopped the fight in the second round because of the beating Barbosa was taking. The crowd was on their feet and screaming for Patricia. She made it all the way to the finals and lost in the final bout on a decision. That same year, she went on to nationals and won her first Boxing National Championship at the Bantam weight class weighing 119 pounds.

“It was the first time there was a National Championship for women and it was held in Augusta, Georgia,” she says. “I was a national champ in Karate, and now in boxing. I was thrilled but it was still bittersweet, because once again I won in front of a loving and supportive crowd, but not my family.”

In 1997, Patricia Alcivar was voted by the USOC to be the Boxer of the Year. She was the first female ever chosen for this honor. The next two years she went back and won two Golden Gloves for New York City. She received many professional boxing contracts, but turned them all down.

“I was waiting for the Olympics to add women’s boxing to the competition,” she says. “You have to be an amateur to qualify for the Olympics in boxing.”

Now she’s ready to begin boxing professionally.

“Through all of the hardships in my life, my father’s sexual, physical and verbal abuse, my mother’s denial and verbal abuse, never feeling supported, I learned to rely on a something much stronger,” she says. “I learned to believe in myself and grew in my faith. Athletics and competing became my outlet. I moved out of the house at 15 and supported myself ever since. When most kids in the neighborhood would fool around or head to clubs, I would run or go to the gym. I never turned to drugs or alcohol to bury my past. I learned to fight, literally.



“My message for others is that no matter how bad things may get, no matter how dark of a hole your life seems to be in, there is hope. You can rise above your past. It never leaves you but you can rise above it, as long as you never, ever give up on yourself.”

How does Patricia Alcivar define success?

“Being who you are supposed to be without fear or shame,” she says. “I am no longer ashamed of myself or my past. It wasn’t my fault. For years, I hid my story thinking people would not accept me because of it. It felt like a black mark on me. But it wasn’t. I was just a kid. I had very little control back then. I no longer regret my past because those hard times taught me something: nobody controls your destiny. I am who I am today, because there is no challenge I can’t beat.”

Patricia is in the running for an Asics Commercial. Check her out and vote for her at http://contest.asicsamerica.com. Simply click on the view gallery link. Her video is the one with the sneakers.