A pair of Launceston fighters suffered contrasting results as they plied their trade on the mainland.
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Boxer Tyler Blizzard collected his second professional win in as many fights but Launceston Boxing and MMA clubmate Casey Lockett had his Australian kickboxing title bout stopped in the second round.
Admitting it wasn't his best fight after a six-kilogram weight cut, the Jeff Fenech-trained Blizzard had a strong support crew watching him in New South Wales.
"The support that I had was unreal, we had a few people come from Tassie and a country town called Boggari [in NSW], that's where my main support came from, so on the night there would have been 50 people there supporting me," he said.
"For a Hadspen boy, I'm blessed, it's overwhelming and humbling to know that people make the effort to come and travel to watch me.
"That's why straight after the fight I was a little bit disappointed in what I sort of gave because I know how much more I can give and I know that the people that come and watch me, usually I can be very entertaining."
The 24-year-old former St Patrick's College student picked up the win by majority points decision 39-37, 39-37 and 38-38.
Blizzard headed straight to Thailand for a two-week training block, eyeing off a fight in September, with Launceston Boxing and MMA Club's Twigs Millwood predicting a bright future.
"Tyler can take it as far as he wants to take it, that's entirely up to him," Millwood said after being in Blizzard's corner on Saturday night.
"I can definitely see him being a world title challenger in years to come if he keeps doing what he's doing now and sticks to the process."
The following night, Millwood was in Victoria with Lockett and described it as "a bad night at the office" against Nasar Kassab, with the fight stopped by the referee in the second round while battling for the 76kg K1 kickboxing title.
"He got hit with a pretty decent right hand in the first round and then a couple of ... blows later in that round - once when he was grounded and one to the back of the head," he said.
"That didn't really help his equilibrium, so he couldn't really get his feet back under him after that."
Despite the result, Millwood was proud of the 22-year-old, who he has worked with for the past nine years alongside Furnace MMA's Steve Wallace
"We're all proud of him, that was a really big fight against a quality opponent on a big card for the Australian title. It doesn't get much bigger than that in Australia, especially for kickboxing," Millwood said.
"All of his preparation was really good, the way he carried himself after the fight was really good and he's calling a rematch already.
"He wasn't too dejected by it all, obviously he had a few minutes to himself where he was devastated but after that he picked his bottom lip up and he kept going."
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