Boxing has a rich history of giving some of the world’s top fighters their big breakthrough. RadioTimes.com rounds up everything you need to know about boxing at the 2020 Tokyo Olympics. <\/p>
Boxing at the Olympic Games has paved the way for numerous fighters to earn a name for themselves and move into the big leagues, with Anthony Joshua, Katie Taylor and Amir Khan all scrapping their way into the public eye with sparkling Olympic displays.<\/p>
This year looks set to offer a fresh batch of fighters the chance to impress on the biggest stage of all, but who will feature at the Games? And will they take their chance?<\/p>
RadioTimes.com<\/a> brings you up to speed with everything you need to know about boxing at the 2020 Olympic Games in Tokyo in the summer of 2021.<\/p> Boxing runs between Saturday 24th July<\/strong> until Sunday 8th August<\/strong>.<\/p> Medal finals begin from Saturday 31st July and run until the competition ends.<\/p> Check out our guide on how to watch Olympics 2020<\/a> or see Olympics on TV today<\/a> for more details, timings, and exclusive expert analysis from some of the biggest names in world sport over the coming weeks.<\/p> Sir Chris Hoy, Beth Tweddle, Rebecca Adlington, Matthew Pinsent and Dame Jess Ennis-Hill are among the stars we have to being their esteemed opinions, so don\u2019t miss what they have to say.<\/p> GB Boxing will send a team of eleven boxers to Tokyo, including European gold medallists Pat McCormack<\/strong> and Lauren Price<\/strong>, fighting at welterweight and middleweight respectively.<\/p> Among the big hitters, Frazer<\/strong> and Cheavon Clarke<\/strong> will be fighting at superheavyweight, while comparative newcomer Caroline Dubois<\/strong> qualified for the Olympics in only her fifth senior fight.<\/p> Traditionally, boxers qualify for a place at the Olympics by winning multiple bouts at regional qualifying events for Asia & Oceania, Europe, Pan-America and Africa.<\/p> The coronavirus pandemic caused the cancellation of the Pan-American tournaments, forcing the IOC to allocate places according to the rankings compiled by the IOC\u2019s newly created Boxing Task Force.<\/p> GB Boxing had a particularly good European qualifier, earning places for 11 fighters and at one point winning a clean sweep of the day\u2019s bouts.<\/p> Traditionally, only amateur boxers could compete at the Olympics, a rule that was changed by the Amateur International Boxing Association in 2016. Optimists believed this was an attempt to bring the big names of professional boxing into the Olympics, while cynics saw it as an attempt by the AIBA to muscle into the lucrative world of professional pugilism by signing contracts with fighters that normally fall under the jurisdiction of traditional sanctioning bodies such as the WBC and WBA.<\/p> In either case, only three professionals took part in 2016, and while there will be at least four this time, the pros at the Olympics are mostly beginners to professional prizefighting who only turned pro when the pandemic put their amateur careers on ice. Don\u2019t be disappointed if you don\u2019t see Saul Alvarez<\/strong> or Anthony Joshua<\/strong> on the bill!<\/p> The AIBA, meanwhile, has been stripped of the right to organise Olympic boxing after reports suggested that the organisation posed a \u201clegal, financial and reputational risk\u201d to the IOC. In its place, an ad hoc Boxing Task Force led by the head of the International Gymnastics Federation, Morinari Watanabe, has been supervising the qualifying tournaments and will oversee the Olympic boxing.<\/p> Cuba has traditionally dominated amateur boxing, largely because its ban on \u201cprofessional\u201d sports in that country means that Cuban fighters stay in the amateur ranks long after other nation\u2019s fighters turn professional. It\u2019s not uncommon for the Cuban team to field veterans of multiple Olympics \u2013 the great Te\u00f3filo Stevenson\u2019s<\/strong> heavyweight gold medals spanned three Olympiads.<\/p> Twenty-five-year-old light-welterweight Andy Cruz<\/strong> will be Havana\u2019s biggest hope in Tokyo \u2013 he already has four gold medals from the World Championships and Pan-American games, and looks set to hang the Olympic variety next to them in his trophy cabinet due to his speedy counterpunching. Radio Times Olympics Special issue<\/a> is on sale now.<\/strong><\/p> If you\u2019re looking for something else to watch check out our\u00a0TV Guide<\/a>\u00a0or visit our\u00a0Sport<\/a>\u00a0hub for all the latest news.<\/strong><\/p>\n Boxing has a rich history of giving some of the world’s top fighters their big breakthrough. RadioTimes.com rounds up everything you need to know about boxing at the 2020 Tokyo Olympics. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":24,"featured_media":2089,"template":"","categories":[1],"acf":[],"uagb_featured_image_src":{"full":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/56\/2021\/07\/boxing-at-the-olympics-who-will-fight-in-tokyo.jpg",620,413,false],"thumbnail":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/56\/2021\/07\/boxing-at-the-olympics-who-will-fight-in-tokyo-150x150.jpg",150,150,true],"medium":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/56\/2021\/07\/boxing-at-the-olympics-who-will-fight-in-tokyo-300x200.jpg",300,200,true],"medium_large":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/56\/2021\/07\/boxing-at-the-olympics-who-will-fight-in-tokyo.jpg",620,413,false],"large":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/56\/2021\/07\/boxing-at-the-olympics-who-will-fight-in-tokyo.jpg",620,413,false],"1536x1536":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/56\/2021\/07\/boxing-at-the-olympics-who-will-fight-in-tokyo.jpg",620,413,false],"2048x2048":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/56\/2021\/07\/boxing-at-the-olympics-who-will-fight-in-tokyo.jpg",620,413,false]},"uagb_author_info":{"display_name":"importmanagerhub@sprylab.com","author_link":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/radiotimes\/author\/importmanagerhubsprylab-com\/"},"uagb_comment_info":0,"uagb_excerpt":"Boxing has a rich history of giving some of the world's top fighters their big breakthrough. RadioTimes.com rounds up everything you need to know about boxing at the 2020 Tokyo Olympics.","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/radiotimes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rss_feed\/2088"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/radiotimes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rss_feed"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/radiotimes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/rss_feed"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/radiotimes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/24"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/radiotimes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2089"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/radiotimes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2088"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/radiotimes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2088"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}When is boxing at the Olympics?<\/strong><\/h2>
Team GB Olympic boxers<\/strong><\/h2>
How do you qualify for Olympic boxing?<\/strong><\/h2>
Why are there no professional boxers in Olympic boxing?<\/strong><\/h2>
Who is the best Olympic boxer?<\/strong><\/h2>
The other great force in Olympic boxing is Uzbekistan, who dominated in Rio and brings an even stronger squad this time around. The most notable squad member is Shakhobidin Zoirov<\/strong>, one of the Olympic \u201cprofessionals\u201d who won a gold medal in Rio and currently has a 3-0 professional record as a bantamweight.
In the women\u2019s events, six-time world champion Mary Kom<\/strong> of India will draw lots of attention in her final Olympics, while the Chinese team boasts a raft of talented fighters including Huang Hsiao-wen<\/strong>, a likely flyweight rival for Kom, and Wu Shih-yi<\/strong> in the lightweights.
The Olympic boxing schedule runs from the 24th of July to the 8th of August.<\/p>
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