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It was a great night for the Service on Friday. For the last three years now we have run a charitable 'Battle of the Badges' boxing competition between ourselves and Police colleagues.

When I say charitable - the proceeds go to charity - there is not much of a charitable nature in the individual bouts, sporting and competitive would be a better term perhaps.

The 'deal' here is that both teams comprise volunteers, some of who have never boxed before, who then follow a training and fitness regime to prepare and then we have a number of bouts selling tickets for charity (every year it has been a sell out with around 1000 spectators) - and it raises thousands of pounds.

The intensity of the training is incredible and all the participants always comment that they have never been fitter - I think last year's firefighters' team lost a combined total of over 20 stones in the run up to the competition.

So what was the result? Well I am delighted to say the firefighters won the event - and it was both a great evening and a great competition.

Could I say congratulations and thank you to all the participants for the months of work to get in to shape and for the thousands of pounds they have raised for charity.

But could I say an especial thanks and congratulations to our firefighters and their coaches who have shown real passion and commitment over those hard months.

This is the second year in a row we have won and of course I would wish to be magnanimous so I will hardly mention it to my good friend and colleague, Chief Constable Peter Fahy.

Last update: 12/09/2011 08:53:16