SEVERAL OF the punchbags are being tormented, a proud grandfather sits watching, as do a couple of school kids, mentally absorbing punches and movements. In the ring the former WBO super featherweight champion Alex Arthur is sparring with Gary McMillan, who will fight at the Kelvin Hall on Friday and insists he will be British welterweight champion within the coming year. Up-and-coming amateur fighters punish themselves with gruelling regimes and all the time the thrum of the speed ball being pummelled competes with the bleeper which sounds every three minutes. Days here are measured in rounds rather than minutes and hours.

In the corner, members who are not due to train until later that evening are enjoying a cuppa and the camaraderie. It's a heady concoction and the gym isn't even officially open, but still they congregate. It's like Field of Dreams – "Build it and they will come". It's also how boxing gyms should be. It's not falling down around everyone's ears, the heating works – though most don't need it as they work up a sweat – it's not dank and dingy. Lochend Amateur Boxing Club is vibrant, it's inclusive and it's successful.

Much of that is down to Terry McCormack and his ethos. Less than two years ago it was a dilapidated scout hut surrounded by an overgrown hedge and waist-high grass. Now it is an increasingly pivotal part of both the Lochend and boxing communities, keeping kids off the street and honing several talented fighters.

From eight-year-olds to women – some looking to progress into the ring, others wanting to get fit – all the way up to the elderly, including former world lightweight champion Ken Buchanan, arguably the best boxer Scotland has ever produced.

Buchanan's photos and memorabilia decorate the walls and, aged 63, he still works out and offers advice. "It's nice to have someone like him around," says McMillan. "He's a legend and he's in the (International] Boxing Hall of Fame so when he gives you wee tips or tells you wee tricks you listen."

The 21-year-old moved to London when he turned pro but as soon as the Lochend gym opened he returned home, convinced the facilities and the coaching was as good as he would get elsewhere. He hasn't regretted it, winning all of his last five fights. But while McCormack is recognised for bringing through talent, he sees the club as more than a fighter factory, it's something far more vocational.

"For years I have worked in other clubs but this is my area and when I bumped into people here they were always asking me when I was going to do something in my own community. I couldn't find premises until one day I noticed this hut through the overgrowth and made some enquiries."

With the help of the local councillor and having assuaged neighbours' fears at a public meeting, he enlisted the help of businesses in the area to help fund the repair work and renovations before eventually opening the doors in July 2007.

"I wanted to give the community somewhere to get fit and somewhere kids could learn discipline and get off the streets. I grew up sparring with the likes of John Hughes. He took to the football and I carried on with the boxing. Others gave it up and ended up on street corners or in trouble."

The club now has over 200 members, with the community reaping the rewards.

"The headteacher at the school phoned me and asked if they could recommend kids to come up to me who were not doing too well and I said 'aye, but they will be treated like everybody else' and they said that's what they wanted. The reason was so-and-so and so-and-so and so-and-so had been three of their worst pupils and were totally uncontrollable, but since they started coming to the club they are behaving and are not causing problems."

While some assume boxing encourages thuggery, McCormack insists it is a sport which teaches discipline and respect. "If you don't have that when you are in the ring, you will get hurt."

Discipline is a big part of the club's ethos. Kids who play truant from school are sent packing, with some having to provide evidence from teachers that they have been at classes. Others have to bring report cards and if they haven't been behaving they are told to come back only when they have learned some focus. Good report cards are pinned to the wall, reformed characters welcomed back.

McCormack also sees the sport as a way to turnaround lives blighted by bullying, weight-problems or low self-esteem. "It's a shame but there are a lot of kids who are bullied and boxing helps them. They don't need to get into fights it's usually enough that the bullies know that they can now defend themselves, then they leave them alone. Joe Calzaghe was bullied, that's why he turned to boxing. Boxing gave him that self-belief and opportunity. People get the wrong picture of boxing sometimes. Kids learn to channel energy into something that keeps them fit and teaches them respect."

As he chats, the kids' class get underway. Around 30-40 boys and girls come along two nights a week and he acknowledges them all by name. The coaches are all volunteers like himself – all the membership money is ploughed straight back into the upkeep of the club and equipment, paying bills and financing travel to fights or on training trips – but the kids hang on their every word.

It is a club which is open to all and even unemployed members who are struggling to pay the fees are offered some leeway. It keeps their spirits up and reminds them about self-respect.

When McCormack first got the keys to the hut, he ripped up the tatty linoleum and was confronted by a younger version of himself as the newspaper underneath carried a report of one of his amateur fights.

Some consider that fate, and in the year-and-a-half since he has unearthed a few more fighters and influenced countless more lives. McCormack and his Lochend gym were obviously meant to be.