The first time I met Ms Efasha Kamarudin, she was breastfeeding her 11-month-old daughter at a Bedok Mall restaurant – the perfect image of a gentle mother.
The next time we met, she was pummelling a heavy punching bag in the Spartans Boxing Club’s Joo Chiat outlet, her latest championship belt prominently displayed at the gym’s entrance.
The 34-year-old barely broke a sweat, while just a short distance away, a group of young boys were wheezing heavily through their training.
“I’m addicted to pain,” she said with a laugh.
As a woman competing professionally in the male-dominated sport of boxing, Ms Efasha described herself as a “chameleon”.
“I have many different versions of (myself). One is a rough girl in gym clothes and then suddenly, I become a mum, very caring. And then when (my husband and I) go out for a date, I have my makeup on and wear sexy clothes,” she said.
“I enjoy being able to morph from one thing to another.”
Her ease with flitting between this multitude of identities made it a no-brainer when it came to choosing her boxing name: “The Face”.
This, she said, is how she wants to represent Singaporean women in the sport – as complex, multifaceted individuals both inside and outside of the ring.
Ms Efasha, better known as “Fash” among her family and friends, in 2016 became the first Singaporean woman to win an international boxing gold medal.
At the time of writing, she was ranked the world’s 15th best boxer in the super flyweight division, referring to fighters weighing about 52kg – and she’s not stopping there.
After a decade of being a boxing coach at Spartans, she recently stepped down to focus on a heavy training season ahead.
Last week, she flew to Bangkok, Thailand for her first eight-round match against a Thai fighter. The stakes were high – winning would have potentially gotten her in the ring against a globally top-ranked fighter for a world title fight this August in the United States.
Her ramped-up training clearly paid off. In Bangkok, “The Face” delivered a knockout blow by the first round, clinching her a decisive victory.
