Whitehawk’s Harvey Dykes is dealing with a last-minute ticket rush ahead of his return to the ring at the Brighton Centre on Friday night.
The 29-year-old has sold more than 500 tickets for each of his last two appearances at the venue, which also came on Harlem Eubank undercards. He looks set to be the best supported boxer on the bill again.
“It has gone crazy these last few days, the phone has been ringing off the hook,” said the 29-year-old.
“It always happens this way, everyone leaves it until the last minute, but I don’t mind it one bit. I love it when the buzz starts to pick up and I know my supporters are getting behind me. I am grateful to every one of them.”
Dykes clearly likes to stay busy. Despite progressing well through the professional ranks, he still delivers a lot of tickets himself and runs his own clearance business, Quick Tip Rubbish Solutions.
This all fits around training full time under the watchful eyes of Don Charles in London and Luke Hewett and Richard Evans in Brighton.
“Things are pretty full on most of time,” Dykes added. “But that seems to work for me at the moment. It keeps me focused and sharp and I get a lot of help from my partner Coral Gipson and mate Sonny Burtenshaw with the tickets.
"At some point in the near future, though, I will focus just on the bits inside the ring. Particularly as titles are just around the corner.”
Dykes goes over six rounds against proven and rugged Belarussian Viktar Chvarkou, his first outing since a bizarre encounter at The York Hall in September when he took on Dorin Krasmaru in his first ten round fight.
Despite clearly outboxing the Ukrainian, a 93-93 draw was announced, a mathematically impossible score without knockdowns or extremely one side rounds. The Boxing Board of Control has since confirmed that there was a mistake with the announcement (stating it should have been 95-95) but not the outcome, which has left most puzzled.
“Everyone saw I won that fight. There were boos in the venue and everyone who watched it on YouTube has been texting me saying I was robbed.
“It hasn’t set me back, though. I did the ten rounds easily and know I am ready for a big fight. The Board have told me I am going to be put forward for the Southern Area as well, so hopefully big things are just around the corner. Maybe even in Brighton!”