Melissa "Mack 10" McMorrow is a Brazilian
American from San Jose, California. She now lives and trains in San
Francisco, California. Melissa is about to make her pro debut after a
successful amateur career.
She began boxing in March of 2005 and had her first match after only
three months of training. She fought locally whenever she could get a
match often moving to different weight classes in order to find
opponents.
In March of 2006 Melissa fought in the flyweight division of Northern
California Golden Gloves wining the tournament against Amber Howard of
San Jose making her the 2006 Northern California Golden Gloves flyweight
champion.
Later that month, she competed in the San Francisco Golden Gloves. She
won her semi-final bout against Amber Howard by an easy margin, but lost
by a close decision to Ava Knight of Chico, California in the final.
In July of 2006, Melissa fought in the
National Golden Gloves in Ft. Lauderdale, Florida. She won by TKO in the
second round to Aileen Viera making her the 2006 National Golden Gloves
Flyweight Champion. By the end of the year Melissa was ranked 3rd in the
nation by USA boxing.
In March of 2007, Melissa fought in the San Francisco USA Road to the
Nationals tournament in San Francisco. With no opponents in her weight
class, she agreed to fight at 114 lbs. She defeated Courtney Ogawa of
Redwood City by a unanimous decision for the San Francisco USA Jr.
Bantamweight Championship.
Later that month, Melissa weighed in for the 2007 Northern California
Golden Gloves in the flyweight division. With no opponent will to fight
at 106, 110, or 114 lbs., Melissa won the 2007 Northern California
Golden Gloves Flyweight Title by walkover.
In March of 2007, Melissa competed in the
USA Nationals in the jr. flyweight division. She lost in the finals
23-22 in a controversial decision to former national champion Marlen
Esparza. The silver medal earned her a second place ranking for 2007 by
USA Boxing.
Melissa trains 6 days a week at 3rd
Street Boxing Gym and Titanium Training Center in San Francisco under
the direction of Paul Wade who is to be her manager and trainer upon
starting as a pro. Melissa says "Paul is a great trainer. He stresses
movement, defense, and creative thinking. Most of all, he is demanding.
It's great to find a trainer who demands more from me than I already
demand from myself." This is a willing combination because Melissa is
already a very self demanding and persevering athlete. In addition to
training in the gym, she runs every morning alternating between long
flat runs, hill training, and intense sprint workouts. Her endurance,
mental strength, confidence, and dexterity are powerful assets to her
boxing skills.
Melissa has always been a top level athlete. She grew up playing soccer
and was an All-American in college then moved on to play semi-pro soccer
in both the US and Brazil. After playing soccer for 18 years, the
disbanding of the Women's United Soccer Association (WUSA), the only
women's professional soccer league, left her with nothing left to strive
for. She began searching for another competitive outlet. Having always
been captivated by boxing, she fell in love with the sport by attending
fight parties thrown by a local motorcycle club in Oakland, California.
She credits the East Bay Rats, a motorcycle club celebrated because of
their boxing events, with the impetus for her pursuit of a boxing
career.
Outside of boxing, Melissa works full time for an architecture firm in
San Francisco called William Duff Architects where she is pursuing an
architecture license. She has an architecture degree from Carnegie
Mellon University. William Duff Architects has designed a number of
retail projects related to sports including Footlocker and Puma. "I love
designing places and objects that are related to sports" says Melissa.
She also has an interest to do graphic design and illustration creating
drawings, sports logos, and advertisements. She is now a pro
boxer.
