Texas ‘Troublemaker’ Jennifer Lozano overcame bullying to become Olympian

For as long as Jennifer Lozano had known what the Olympics were, it had been her dream to be an Olympian. For the longest time, that’s all it was, a dream. Lots of people where she comes from have dreams. Growing up in the border town of Laredo, Tex., an axiom had been repeated so often to her that it had essentially become established law: “If you’re born in Laredo, you die in Laredo. If you leave it’s only to come back.”

Words are only as powerful as the power they are given, and if the 21-year-old had accepted them as truth, there’s no way she would have earned silver at the Pan American Games last year in Chile, or won two National Golden Gloves titles, or three straight U.S. National Championships. She certainly wouldn’t have qualified for the 2024 Olympics, and yet there she, in Paris, preparing to represent her nation on the biggest stage in sports, as the 110-pound (50 kg) female boxer.

Walking through Olympic Village in France, Lozano has so far has spotted 4-time Olympic gymnastics gold medalist Simone Biles, plus Gennadiy Golovkin, the future boxing Hall of Famer who now presides over the the Olympic committee of his native Kazakhstan. As surreal as this moment has been, she isn’t grappling with imposter syndrome or stage fright.

She knows she belongs here.

“I was expecting to be more nervous and a lot more shocked, or that it would feel different,” said Lozano of her time so far at Olympic Village in France. “Don’t get me wrong, I’m definitely grateful to be here and to be making history, but I feel that with my training, my mentality and experiences, this is just another tournament with a different name to it.”

If fighting seems like it comes natural to her, it’s because it had to.

Bullied for being overweight and having a distinct Spanish accent, even while living in a city where over 95 percent of the population identifies as Latino, Lozano frequently found herself bloodied and battered by her tormentors after school. Instead of seeking comfort from her parents, she kept it inside, fearing that her parents, steeped in the machismo mindset that often pervades the Mexican American culture she grew up in, would turn their anger towards her for seeking an easy way out.

Instead, they enrolled her in a boxing gym at age nine, and she had her first fight at age 11. Lozano had to fight just to get a fight, however.

“I would see boys come in with belts, medals and trophies and I wanted to do that too, so I told my mom about wanting to compete. We spoke to the coach about it and he immediately said no because I was a girl and because I was still overweight and that boxing wasn’t for me,” remembers Lozano, an aggressive southpaw who uses a stinging right jab to close the distance and bang to the head and body in close.

Her mother soon moved her to another gym on the other side of the city. There, she says she encountered “big time boy egos” while sparring with the boys, who would taunt and heckle her in the gym. After bruising both their faces and egos in sparring, few questioned whether she belonged. 

“Within a couple weeks of being in their teenager classes, I got in the ring and sparred boys, and then all of a sudden there were no more boys to spar because no one wanted to step in the ring with me anymore,” said Lozano, who still trains there under Eddie Vela at Boxing Pride Fitness.

“The coaches then came up to me and asked me if I wanted to be part of their competing team. Since then I’ve been with them through every win and every loss.”

While some in her community felt that women had no place being in a boxing ring, one place she didn’t encounter those sentiments was in her own family. Her grandmother would call from Mexico so they could watch the fights of Mexican legend Jackie Nava together. She gave Jennifer the nickname “Traviesa,” or “Troublemaker,” which she still carries into the ring today, all while foretelling the day when her granddaughter would be the boxing star whom others tuned in to watch. She also took strength from her mother, who sacrificed to make sure the children would not go without.

“[My grandmother] would always say I was going to be up there just like [Nava] as a world champion, be better and that I’d make so many differences not just in my city but around the world,” said Lozano.

“My mother inspired me to keep going despite the losses and downs that I had during my journey. I saw her fall not just once but many times growing up, where we were down bad, and she never gave up, never said she couldn’t or wouldn’t. She always showed and proved that she would and could, with what she had, just to take care of me and my siblings.”

To her estimation, Lozano has had somewhere between 80 and 101 fights, competing all over the world, including Chile, Finland, Ecuador, Turkey and the Czech Republic. That experience of fighting in front of different crowds conditioned her to what she may encounter at the Olympics, and helped her develop thick skin.

“It for sure gave me a close look not just at competition but what it’ll be like, the pressure, the envy, the judges, the arena, the shouts against you, but also the glory and the feeling of greatness as well with the best athletes around the world,” said Lozano.

Lozano and the rest of her USA Boxing teammates will have plenty to prove in Paris. No American boxer has won gold since Claressa Shields brought home the top prize in 2012 and 2016, while the male boxers have been in an even worse drought, having not earned a gold since Andre Ward accomplished the feat in 2004.

Joining Lozano in Paris will be seven other American boxers, including fellow women Alyssa Mendoza (57 kg), Jajaira Gonzalez (60 kg), Morelle McCane, plus male boxers Jahmal Harvey (57 kg), Omari Jones (71 kg) and Joshua Edwards (super heavyweight).

Lozano says she is familiar with many of the boxers in her division, which will see action in the round of 32 on July 28 at the North Paris Arena.

She had seen some of them in past competitions, like the Philippines’ Aira Villegas, who beat Lozano by split decision in 2022, and Brazil’s Caroline De Almeida, who beat her by unanimous decision last October in the Pan Am Games gold medal match. Still, Lozano believes she has as good as anyone to walk out of Paris with the coveted gold medal around her neck because of the work she has done since then.

“The only difference now is that I’ve only gotten better and smarter. When I faced them the first time I was young and fresh, now I’m experienced and matured in the international scene. My chances are definitely high, higher than what my competitors think. I’m different, and when my time under the bright lights comes it’ll show,” said Lozano.

Lozano’s plans for after the Olympics are all contingent upon whether boxing, perennially on the Olympic chopping block due to myriad scandals, is included in the program for the Los Angeles Games in 2028. More than likely she envisions herself turning professional, with the dream of unifying world titles.

At the forefront of her mind in Paris will be the little girls who are tuning in on television to watch the Olympics for the first time. Lozano didn’t know that Olympic boxing existed until she was at her first national tournament and heard that another Texas woman, Marlen Esparza, was about to be part of the first class of female boxers to compete at the Olympics in 2012.

Seeing someone from where she came from succeeding in London made it seem possible for her to do the same in Paris.

Perhaps there will be another girl who is getting picked on for the way she talks or looks, or is being told that her place is in the kitchen and not the boxing ring. That little girl may be watching the broadcast over the next week and, for the first time, believe.

So much more is at stake in Paris than just ending a medal drought.

“I represent every kid who’s ever been through what I’ve been through. I want them to not just watch me fight but hear my story and know that no matter where you come from, how you grew up, what your environment looks like, how much you may get judged, how many people don’t want to see you win, that at the end of the day anything is possible and only you have the power to write your own story and make your own path,” said Lozano.

Ryan Songalia has written for ESPN, the New York Daily News, Rappler and The Guardian, and is part of the Craig Newmark Graduate School of Journalism Class of 2020. He can be reached at ryansongalia@gmail.com.

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