Goals, Inside Ring and Out, Spur Him On : Martial arts: Cash McCallum wants to hold boxing and kickboxing titles, then be a movie star.

Cash McCallum, the World Kickboxing Council heavyweight champion from Irvine, faces a continual challenge: retaining sparring partners.

Neil Sarembock, 1981 World Games kickboxing champion, is the most recent of McCallum’s sparring partners who refuse to get in the ring with him. A spinning back-kick from McCallum broke three of Sarembock’s vertebrae last November.

“I have no sympathy for my opponent,” said McCallum, who will fight Pedro Fernandez of Tijuana, Mexico, for the vacant World Kickboxing Assn. North American title tonight at the Bren Center in Irvine. “I respect him for getting in the ring with me but then it’s time to show him that he made a mistake.”

McCallum has a 7-0 record with four knockouts. He uses a wildly aggressive style in which he almost appears to be throwing random kicks and punches.

Kirk Thompson, one of McCallum’s trainers at the Westminster Boxing Club, said they are trying to make McCallum into a calmer, more strategic kickboxer. “He’s a lot more calm (than he was when he started),” Thompson said. “He’s sharper and he’s really thinking about what he’s doing in the ring when he’s in there.”

Said McCallum: “A mature fighter will come in more relaxed. He looks like he’s having a good time.”

McCallum, 24, has been studying martial arts since he was four years old. He said he has been “enjoying life to the fullest” in his current career.

In September, he plans to begin a boxing career and hopes to hold boxing and kickboxing titles at the same time.

Looking past that, McCallum said that he plans to retire at age 29 “to save (his) mind and body” and begin an acting career. McCallum hopes to be an action film star in the style of Chuck Norris and Bruce Lee.

Kickboxing promoter Nick Bartlett, who handles all of McCallum’s fights, said that action films, such as “The Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles,” “Bloodsport” and “Kickboxer I and II,” have increased the sport’s popularity in this country. Bartlett said that McCallum’s last fight, in Palm Springs, drew a crowd of 3,000 people.

Bartlett and his wife, Maggie, who live in Costa Mesa, have known McCallum since he was a small child when Nick Bartlett and Cash’s father, R.J. McCallum, skated together for the Green Bay Bombers roller derby team and later worked together as promoters.

Cash McCallum hopes to one day open a martial arts studio and a counseling center for troubled youth.

Said Thompson about McCallum: “It’s really funny because out of the ring he’s such a humble person. You’d never think he’s a fighter.”

McCallum, whose parents were divorced, said he might not have weathered his own childhood very well had it not been for the martial arts. “It taught me respect and discipline and has given me goals,” McCallum said.