Trainer Moises Sanchez at the Church Street Boxing Gym.   (Photo: Jeremy Liebman)

• Church St. Boxing Gym

  25 Park Pl., 212-571-1333

  As any fighter will tell you, the value of a boxing trainer is relative to the individual chemistry between trainer and boxer. That said, boxing hobbyists seem to have no problem connecting with Moises Sanchez, a gregarious, diminutive Puerto Rico native who won the Golden Gloves in 1972 as a 17-year-old lightweight. When Justin Blair opened his Church St. Boxing Gym in 1997, Sanchez signed on as head trainer and coordinated construction of the cavernous, gritty space, which has served the likes of Bernard Hopkins, Evander Holyfield, and Laila Ali. Sanchez splits his time between training Golden Gloves hopefuls and working out boxing dilettantes like Marica McKeel, who says, “The word in this place is intense.” Sanchez trains the part-timers as hard as his fighters, running everyone through the necessary floor work—shadowboxing, footwork—before goading them into the ring.

From the 2007 Best of New York issue of New York Magazine