Boxing ace Jeffrey Claro dies after falling into coma following sparring session
Filipino pro had just turned 20 and leaves behind a young daughter after injury suffered from seemingly innocuous punch
A FILIPINO boxer has died after a tragic sparring injury saw him fall into a coma.
Jeffrey Claro was hit with a seemingly innocuous punch on Friday - just two days after his 20th birthday.
And Claro passed away on Sunday morning with his his father, sister, and girlfriend by his side.
The ace's mother, two-year-old daughter and the child's mother reportedly arrived shortly after his death.
Claro, whose gym is close to Philippines capital Manila, was due to fight on November 19.
Lorence Rosas, a pro boxer who trained with him at Empire Boxing Gym was with Claro and trainer Remus Arsula when the incident occurred.
He was fighting a smaller boxer known only as Diego and the session was scheduled for two rounds.
Rosas said: "When we were going there at 7 am in the morning, he said, 'Brother Lorence, I'm so excited because this is the first sparring [of training camp].'"
His account added that Claro looked fine until going down with 45 seconds of the second session remaining.
He smiled and asked to finish the round but the session, during which there were no illegal blows to the back of the head was stopped.
Rossas claims about 10 minutes passed before Claro showed any signs of being in trouble.
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He added: "After the sparring he's smiling, he picked up his gloves and then he's laughing because of the knockdown in sparring.
"He's smiling, he says he's good, then after that his legs were shaking, he holds onto the ring, we carried him on the chair. After that he went to sleep."
Rosas - who had known Claro since 2015 - said his pal's four defeats were due to a lack of training.
He recorded his first win over Oscar Lim in the junior bantamweight division and had headed to Empire Gym to train with Jen Javellana.
Former training partner Angel Aurelio described him as "a funny and a good person not only to me, but to the whole gym. He loves to smile, he is talkative."