In his first eight months as a competitive boxer, Thunder Innis has punched his way to bronze, silver and golden gloves championships. In amateur boxing, winning those three titles is known as the triple crown.
And to get there so quickly is extremely rare.
“It’s honestly amazing,” said Jag Seehra, one of Innis’s coaches at Inner City Boxing PG. “If I talk about my own experience, for me to get those titles in one year, I would never even think that. But Thunder is just one special athlete. He’s so hungry for this sport.”
Seehra says even for exceptional boxers, it’s more common for the completion of the triple crown to take years, not months.
For Innis, the first jewel in the crown was the BC Bronze Gloves championship, which he claimed in September 2024 in Chilliwack. Then, in January 2025 in Medicine Hat, he won the Alberta Silver Gloves championship. And, most recently — in April in Lacombe — he added the Alberta Golden Gloves championship to his collection.
Innis, 16, completed the triple crown at the Alberta Golden Gloves when he beat Bennett Cressman of Regina by unanimous decision. With about a dozen fights already on his resume, Cressman was the more experienced boxer, but Innis — in his fifth overall fight — was too much for him.
“Thunder did brilliantly, and we are so proud that we are his coaches,” said Inner City’s Kenny Lally. “It brings us so much joy that this fighter is able, within a year, to bring back a bronze, silver and golden gloves. It just shows the dedication of this kid.”
With Seehra and Lally there to provide the guidance, Innis draws his inspiration from within. He’s from the Key First Nation in Saskatchewan and, every time he steps into the ring, he fights as a representative of his people. He also fights in honour of his late father, Daniel, who passed away in 2020 when Innis was 11 years old.
“Living this life without a dad, it’s been really hard — it’s been a struggle, but it’s been a motivator, to make him proud and to be just like him one day,” Innis said. “I hope he’s proud of me. I want to make him proud.”
When Innis first started training at Inner City Boxing PG, he was close to six feet tall but more than 260 pounds — a weight that was prohibitive when it came to finding opponents for him. And, Lally recalls that “we struggled with Thunder a bit, he wasn’t really listening to us, he felt that he could do it himself.”
A turning point came when Lally and Seehra took Innis to a fight card in Fort St. John simply to watch, not to step into the ring.
“We were hoping to show him what competition was like, hoping it would light his flame — which it did,” Lally said. “As soon as we got back, he started running more, started getting his weight down. And then from there, we put him in the ring in Quesnel and we saw the brilliance of him. It was like the door opened. He got his confidence in his ability to throw.”
Innis then introduced himself to the rest of the province at the BC Bronze Gloves. At the Alberta Silver Gloves, not only did he lock up the title, he was named best boxer in the tournament. His dominance at the Alberta Golden Gloves was the latest step in his evolution.
Through his intense training schedule at Inner City, and also working on his fitness outside of the gym, Innis has transformed his body into a 176-pound fighting machine. While he’s much lighter, he still hits with incredible force.
“He has carried the power with him,” Seehra said. “Power is God-given. You can train it, but if you have it with you, it’s always going to be a part of you. He’s lost so much weight that in (Alberta) Golden Gloves, the guy looked way bigger than him, but his skill just surpassed him. Anybody that he’s been in the ring with, his skills have been unmatched.”
Lally says Innis has surpassed expectations for where he would be at this point in his career.
“With Thunder’s work ethic, he carries the confidence with him that he knows he’s in shape,” Lally said. “That is a huge attribute to have. Another thing Thunder has is a very good IQ. He’s able to think in the ring in real time. A lot of fighters, when things start getting hot and they’re in a real firefight, they start panicking. Thunder is very calculating. Even if he’s in a firefight, you can watch the kid’s eyes, and he’s watching every movement of his opponent. For a kid with five fights to have that kind of quality, I have never seen that, personally.
“Thunder is the most complete fighter I’ve ever seen at such a young stage,” Lally added. “And he just gets better and better and better.”
Innis says he’s “incredibly thankful” for all the work his coaches have done with him. He’s also grateful to have his mom, Leticia, in his life and in his corner.
“She’s been my No. 1 supporter,” he said. “And she’s the one who has taught me about my ways, my culture, and has taught me almost everything I know now. She’s been through a lot in her life, and she’s inspiring.”
Looking ahead to Innis’s near future as a boxer, both Lally and Seehra want to elevate him from the novice category (zero to 10 fights) to the open category. With Innis’s 5-0 record, Lally says they could declare him as an open fighter right now but they want to get him a couple more novice bouts so that he can continue to learn.
Once Innis steps up into the open class, he’ll be eligible to start fighting for spots on Team BC and Team Canada.
During his own boxing career, Lally won seven national championship titles and competed in Olympic qualifying tournaments in 2012 and 2016. He fell short of the Olympics both times, but he sees Innis taking that last step one day.
“He’ll be an Olympian,” Lally said. “Mark my words, Thunder will be an Olympian.”
