Paul Sousa leader of the Champions for Charity pack when it comes for fundraising for MacKids
By Jeff Hicks
KITCHENER —
Syd Vanderpool scanned the 10 future boxing beasts before him.
It was Day 1 of Champions for Charity training and the Red Team coach, a former belt-wearing pro pugilist, wanted to know which ferocious animal best represented each feral fighter.
The first answer? A terror-inducing turtle.
The second answer? A dog.
That canine callout came from Paul Sousa, president of Steed and Evans — one of the largest and most-respected road-building contractors and materials suppliers in Southern Ontario.
“Not a little dog,” the 5-foot-7 Cambridge native snarled. “I said, I’m a BIG dog.”
Vanderpool barked the arrival of the Big Dog through the high ceilings of Sydfit Health Centre.
“Woof, woof!” Vanderpool shouted. “The Big Dog is in The House!”
What else would you expect from Sousa, a 56-year-old first-time fighter who grew up howling and prowling among the coyotes of Churchill Park.
He certainly is the Top Dog when it comes to Champions for Charity solo fundraising. As Family Day arrived, his $47,000 collected for McMaster Children’s Hospital became the highest single-fighter total in Mandy Bujold’s three Champions for Charity events since 2019.
The the big 10-bout night — the sold-out Brawl at Tapestry Hall on April 4 pits Red Team vs. Blue Team — was still weeks away with more than $407,000 raised for MacKids.
Soon, Sousa’s Unleash the Big Dog robe —sponsored by the Knuckle-Draggers crew he goes on a golf trip with each year and designed by his wife Miranda — will be ready in black and red.
He’s one of the senior Big Dogs on the golf trip. His robe logo will be a boxing bulldog.
“I never gave boxing the recognition it deserved — I never did,” said Sousa, who likes training for his first charity fight. “I find myself talking about boxing all the time. It’s crazy. I find myself watching boxing. It’s amazing how strategic a fight can be. I love it.”
Sugar Ray Leonard is his favourite fighter. Maybe, it was how the quick 5-foot-10 Leonard won gold at the Montreal Olympics or jabbed Roberto Duran into a “No Más” rematch resignation.
“I wish I had a quarter of his speed,” Sousa says of Leonard.
What Sousa has ia plenty of intensity to give back to the community and help kids.
That’s why he’s among dozens of construction industry professionals in a southwestern Ontario organization called STOIDI.
It’s group with no overhead and a mysterious name — a genus of jumping spiders is called a Stoidis — that makes no left-to-right sense.
The mandate? Help children and youth.
“It’s just giving back,” said Sousa, who has six kids between ages 23 and 30 in his blended family with Miranda. “Everybody who’s part of STOIDI is in a position to give back.”
That’s the motivation for STOIDI as one of the main Champions for Charity sponsors. Sousa’s wife Miranda provided him with a different kind of encouragement when Bujold selected him to be one of this year’s Champions for Charity.
“You are going to win,” Miranda told him. “And you are not going to embarrass the family.”
Sousa laughed. A year ago, his wife inspired him to get back to the gym where he lost 21 pounds. The sharp words that chased the flab from his torso?
“You are a waste of an athlete,” she said to the former volleyball bumper and basketball traveler as they chatted on their hobby farm on the edge of Cambridge.
“You can do so much but you do nothing.”
Now, he’s the Big Dog is doing something special. He’s getting ready for his ring debut, giving back by getting punched in the face.
“No boxer goes in the ring without getting hit,” he said.
