Tanned girls in the ring

Ruth Addicott meets the ring girls ahead of the ZT Fight Night in Hove this month and listens to the debate

By day they have smartly dressed office jobs in property and finance, by night they are in bikinis, being splattered with blood and saliva at the ring side of a boxing match.

Meet Jenna Thompson and Claire Groombridge, the Sussex ring girls who put the glamour into fight night, while the opponents square up and throttle each other behind them.

Both Jenna and Claire will be appearing at the ZT Fight Night at Hove Town Hall on February 15.

The event, which used to be called Zero Tolerance, has featured a mesh cage and sparked its fair share of controversy in the past. It is a mixture of the aggression and raw energy of hybrid boxing and kick boxing.

The name changed, the cage was removed - but the ring girls stuck their heels in and stayed, despite a growing undercurrent of hostility from some corners of the sporting community.

Kitted out in skimpy bikinis, skyscraper heels and fake tan, they are essential "eye candy" to pull in the crowds, according to event organiser and fighter Sol Gilbert.

Others see ring girls as a gratuitous and outdated concept, which is degrading to women in a sport they are now trying to excel at.

Jenna, 26, from Shoreham, first became a ring girl when she got involved with Cage Rage in Wembley, learning the role for mesh-cage fights which were broadcast on Sky TV. Now she is a firm fixture at the ZT Fight Nights in Sussex.

"I like the atmosphere," she says.

"It's good fun with the crowd and everything. The worst part is getting covered in splats of blood and saliva when you're walking next to the ring.

I did a Cage Rage event once and there was a guy who got punched in the head so many times his tear ducts were bleeding. He was literally crying blood. There are always broken noses, split eyebrows and split cheeks but we know our place. They have paramedics for that."

Apart from looking good, the main role of the ring girls is to lead the fighters onto the floor, get the crowd cheering and hold up the ring cards between each round. They then go back in the ring afterwards to present the medals and pose for pictures.

Claire, 22, from Hove, walks on stage alongside Jenna. She has been a ring girl for 12 months and has also got used to the fighters falling through the ropes and landing literally at her feet.

"The first time was a bit of a shock,"

she says. "We get splattered sometimes, which is not always pleasant, but we've got used to it. You can see the determination and concentration in the participants' eyes and it's nice to see someone so involved in a sport they love."

The worst part, according to Jenna, is watching their friends fight - but even she admits she's become hardened to it now. "It's aggressive but that's the nature of the sport, they're there to fight," she observes.

Both Claire and Jenna were hired by Sol Gilbert, owner of ZT Fight Skool, who has been fighting for 17 years.

Having won a string of titles in Britain and Europe, he knows all too well the commitment put in by the fighters.

He puts himself through an intensive training regime six weeks before a fight and sleeps in a tracksuit as well as two jumpers and a plastic sauna suit the night before the weigh-in to ensure he meets the correct weight.

"Your mouth's dry, your tongue is dry, your lips are cracked and you're thinking about the fight. It all adds to the pressure," he says.

While he's sweating it out in a sauna suit, Jenna and Claire have their own regime - a spray tan and manicure to top off their outfits. Jenna normally wears black skin-tight hot pants, heels and a bikini or lace halterneck top.

"We do have a style we follow: glamorous and sexy but not too tacky,"

she says. "I work for a property investment company in the day so it's normally a mad rush after work. My colleagues aren't bothered. I don't think many of them even know."

The hot pants are enough to distract most men from their pint and prompt a fair amount of cheering, banter and wolf-whistles from the crowd.

Jenna insists it's never leery (security take care of that) and the crowd is really friendly.

"It's always quite rowdy but I'm usually too busy concentrating on what I'm doing to hear what they're saying, especially if they're all shouting at once," she says.

Claire is also busy concentrating (having once inadvertently held up the card saying "Round 3" when the match had finished - although she claims it was Jenna who made her do it).

She's quite happy being a ring girl.

"The guys like to see women. We may get a few dirty looks from their girlfriends but most are fine because they know what to expect," she says.

"Most of the blokes don't take any notice once the match has started anyway. I don't think it's degrading, all we're doing is walking around."

Jenna agrees, adding she has never come across any hard-core feminists.

"There wouldn't be any point in going to anything like that if you didn't agree with ring girls because that's the way it is and has been for years,"

she says. "I'd definitely encourage people to go if they haven't been before.

How can you know you're not going to like it, unless you've been?"

Try and get some serious background on the role of ring girls and you struggle. With website after site offering pictures and videos, there's plenty of material. But after wading through the "Hottest" ring girls, "Big Mama"-style ring girls or, for those wanting an eyeful "Stockton's topless"

ring girls, it's easy to see why they get the flak they do.

Tiffany Williams, British Full Contact Ratings Flyweight champion and an instructor at Kicks Martial Arts Centre, in Lewes Road, is one of a number of women involved in the sport who question the need for ring girls. She points out major Thai boxing events abroad are just as popular without them - so why should they be necessary in Britain?

Tiffany cites the example of Bangkok and Thailand generally, where Thai boxing fights are held almost every night of the week in packed stadiums with a total absence of ring girls.

"Over the years I've attended many shows, either as a fighter, corner woman, or as a spectator. Originally, all the major shows I attended had ring girls but over the past few years this has definitely changed," she says.

"The absence of ring girls does not seem to affect the number of spectators or their appreciation of the event and it definitely doesn't affect the quality of the fights."

Personal trainer Sam Foster is also against the idea of ring girls, claiming all they do is make women feel even more insecure about their bodies.

She coaches women of all ages who often have very low self-esteem and poor opinions of themselves, affecting their relationships, career prospects and social lives.

"Encouraging a sexual image of women in sport only re-inforces the insecurities normal' women may have," she says.

"It sets an unrealistic expectation of what we should look like in both men's and women's heads. I don't think it's the most respectful thing to do but, then again, if you decide to flaunt your body for the pure attention of men then you're not too bothered what women or their wives or girlfriends think."

Other women who take the sport seriously have an entirely different take, however.

Vanessa Lavender, a black belt in karate believes ring girls are "decoration" and shouldn't be mistaken for anything else.

"It can be a bit squirm-making at times but they perform a function.

It's possibly an outdated and embarrassing one from a female point of view but it's an institution that's been going on for such a long time, I don't think they should be lambasted for what they do," she says.

Vanessa points out ring girls are no different to the cheerleaders you'd find at basketball games or bikini-clad models draped over a Ferrari at a motor show. "I have much more of an issue with that," she adds. "Mainly because I can't see the car. Ring girls wouldn't put me off going to an event like this."

Donna Poplett set up Fight Skool in Hove with her partner Sol in May 2003, after coming back from a training holiday in Thailand.

She still trains in Thai boxing twice a week and was partly responsible for introducing the ring girls to the ZT Fight Night in the first place. She feels they bring glamour and extra entertainment for the guys.

Donna claims the event isn't just for men, asserting that while a lot of people associate fighting with a brutal mentality, there's no attitude or bravado on the night.

The crowd isn't made up of thugs, Sol adds, but professional businessmen - solicitors, doctors and councillors.

Although the majority of women in the crowd are girlfriends, he says it's a 40/60 split. It may have been condemned in the past as "the human equivalent of cockfighting", but times are changing, he says, and they are even getting a growing number of calls from groups of girls wanting VIP tables.

Sol, who claims women are "just as bloodthirsty as the guys", is even planning to introduce a female fight at the next event.

"We have a very strong following of girls coming to train and I'd like to see more women competing," he says.

"It's not just a man's sport, they have a lot to offer. Not only are you getting a good workout, you're learning how to defend yourself. At the end of the day, it's a horrible world out there and being able to stand up for yourself is essential."

While the ring girls and women who train to fight at the gym are a world apart, Sol says they have an understanding. He doesn't believe the ring girls put women off, whether they're spectating or taking part.

"There are feminine girls and masculine girls and they respect each other's boundaries," he says.

"Claire and Jenna are very sexy ladies, they've got very good bodies. At the end of the day, the fight is a public facility and there's a demand for it - let the public make up their mind."

As much as they love the night and respect the opponents, nothing could convince either Jenna or Claire to get in the ring and fight themselves.

"I couldn't stand anyone punching me," says Claire. "I'm too much of a girl. I leave that to the men."

Jenna agrees: "I'd definitely encourage people to go but I don't think it's a women's sport, it's far too aggressive. I'd be afraid of breaking a fingernail," she muses.

Harvey Marketing Events will be hosting ZT Fight Night at Hove Town Hall, Norton Road, Hove on February 15. For tickets, call 07775 513307 ZT Fight Skool is at Unit 2 Hove Business Park, Fonthill Road, Brighton BN3 6HA. Call 01273 202226 or visit www.ztfightskool.com