It was a matter of seconds. The referee Leonel Mercado he stops the fight because the protector of José Muñoz from Barranquilla falls. his rival, Luis Andres Quinonez Guzman, goes to his own corner. But on the last step, he stumbles slightly. Mercado, who sees him pass behind him, orders him, following the rules, that he must go to the neutral corner. There began the drama for Quiñónez, whose life is in danger in Barranquilla…
The drama of Quinonez
The one born in Barrancabermeja (Santander) is in the first 72 hours of observation after being operated on Sunday morning in the North General Clinicwhere they removed a blood clot from his brain, after losing by knockout in the eighth and last round of the card organized by the Quadrilateral company in the Elijah Chegwin ColiseumSaturday night.
Quiñónez, wearing black shorts, with stripes on the sides and a yellow waist, obeys and runs the distance of six meters and, again, stumbles, now in the penultimate step, grabbing and holding on to the ropes with red gloves. The referee has his back, pending Muñoz. Instantly, he steps to the center of the ring and signals the resumption of the fight for the vacant national junior welterweight title.
Close to the ropes, where Quiñónez has not come out, Muñoz throws three hooks to the head and misses with his blue gloves. Then he launches two ‘jabs’ to take distance, also to the head, but it doesn’t hit and Quiñónez, 25, collapses…
The referee does not decree fall by blow, with his hand movements. But the nearby judge, David Silva, indicates that there was a blow. Then Mercado turns his head to the left, to the technical table –headed by commissioner Rodolfo Castillo–, where the man who controls the time, Ezequiel Suárez, keeps the count by three. Mercado decides to follow her in four until she reaches 10 and decree the withering knockout at 2:30.
Until then, the emotional fight was even and on the judges’ cards –Silva, Milton Mercado (brother of the referee) and Manuel Arroyo– it was tied. That assault defined the result between Quiñónez, with a record of 10-0, with 6 knockoutsand that the day before weighed 63.5 kilograms (the maximum limit of the category), and Muñoz, with a record of 8-0, with 6 knockouts and who weighed 62.6.
moments of tension
The ring side doctor, Enrique Daza, had gone up twice at the referee’s request due to an injury to Muñoz’s right eyelid, who received a protection account for putting his knee on the canvas at the doctor’s first call. “Water got into my eye!” Muñoz exclaimed.
In Quiñónez’s corner, his trainer Miguel ‘Ñato’ Guzmán, assisted by his son –of the same name–, to motivate him, told him that he was going to stop the fight twice, but the boxer said no both times. And at the break of the fifth, he told him to shoot more and hurry, that they were going for the seventh. Quiñónez looked at the girl who carries the number of the assaults and said: ‘Professor, let’s go for the sixth’. It was apparently fine…
With Quiñónez lying down, the referee called the doctor. Enrique Daza sprung into action. Quiñónez was awake and responded to visual stimuli by following the doctor with his gaze. The doctor ordered the boots removed. A medical assistant ran a pen over the boxer’s bare feet and he too responded, reacting.
But after a short time, the hands, free of the gloves, stiffened, a symptom of neurological damage. Was when Daza called the paramedics and ordered to take him to a clinic. The clock read 10:27 p.m. when he walked past this journalist.
When they put him on the stretcher, carried by personnel dressed in yellow, Quiñónez loses consciousness. He is transferred to the nearby General Clinic of the North, traveling about 300 meters in the ambulance. There, after the pertinent tests, he was operated on Sunday morning for a clot in the brain, prior to an induced coma, while the members of his sports team remained outside the clinic.
Among them, Miguel ‘Ñato’ Guzmán, whom Quiñónez contacted through Facebook almost five years ago to begin his professional career in Barranquilla, on April 6, 2018, sleeping for 12 months in his own gym in the La Magdalena neighborhood and receiving food. at the coach’s house, before moving to the Montes neighborhood, where he currently lives. And where he is expected to return, after spending the delicate initial 72 hours, in the company of five relatives who arrived this Sunday from his native Barrancabermeja…
Estewil Quesada
DNA Editor
Barranquilla
more sports news
#Luis #Quiñónez #dramatic #fight #fighting #life