Boxing Ireland 2008 Olympic Games Beijing, China Bernard O’Neill IABA Press Officer Table of Contents Twenty Quick Facts ....................................................................................................1 Profiles of Ireland‘s Olympic Boxers Ken Egan (Captain) ......................................................................................................4 Darren Sutherland.........................................................................................................6 John Joe Joyce..............................................................................................................7 John Joe Nevin .............................................................................................................8 Paddy Barnes................................................................................................................9 Profiles of High Performance Coaches Billy Walsh.................................................................................................................10 Zuar Anita ..................................................................................................................10 2008 Olympic Qualifying Tournaments General Overview.......................................................................................................11 Classified Results of 2008 Olympic Qualifying Champaign Athens, Greece Olympic Qualifying Tournament........................................................14 Pescara, Italy Olympic Qualifying Tournament...........................................................15 Chicago, USA World Senior Boxing Championships..................................................16 Ireland’s Olympic Boxing History ........................................................................17 Irish Olympic Medal Winners ...............................................................................21 1 Twenty Quick Facts 1. Bantamweight John John Nevin qualified for the 2008 Olympics in Pescara, Italy on a day that only exists once every four years, February 29 th (2008). 2. Irish captain Ken Egan has yet to be beaten in Irish competition this century having won eight senior titles in a row. 3. Paddy Barnes is the fifth boxer from the Holy Family club in Belfast to qualify for the Olympics. 4. John Joe Joyce is the first ever boxer from the St Michael’s Athy to qualify for the Olympics. 5. Darren Sutherland claimed his third Irish senior title in a row after coming from behind to beat his great rival Darren O’Neill in a thrilling middleweight final at the National Stadium last January. 6. Michael Carruth won Ireland’s only gold in the boxing ring at the 1992 Olympics in Barcelona, Wayne McCullough claimed silver the same day. 7. Belfast bantamweight John McNally won Ireland’s first Olympic boxing medal (silver) at the 1952 Olympic Games in Helsinki. Finland’s Pennti Hamalainen beat McNally on a majority 2-1 decision. 8. McNally’s silver was the first medal Ireland had won in any sport since Pat Callaghan and Bob Tisdall won track & field gold at the 1932 Olympics in Los Angeles. 9. The late Fred Tiedt won Ireland’s second silver medal at Olympic level after Nicolae Linca from Romania controversially beat him in the 1956 welterweight final in Melbourne. 10. The editor of Ring magazine, Nat Fleischer said the decision to award Linca gold at the expense of Dublin born Tiedt was the most disgraceful decision he had ever witnessed. Linca passed away this summer. 11. Irish head coach Billy Walsh was born in Manchester and is a loyal United supporter. Walsh has won seven Irish senior titles. 12. Zuar Antia, one of Ireland’s boxing coaches at the 2008 Olympics, won three senior titles in his native Georgia. 13. Paddy Barnes club coach Gerry Storey, was awarded an MBE for his services to boxing in Belfast. Storey is a former coach of Barry McGuigan. 14. Barnes qualified for the Olympics at the World Championships at the University of Illinois in Chicago last October. 15. The Championships attracted a record entry of 623 boxers from 114 nations. 2 16. Founded in 1911, the Irish Amateur Boxing Association will bid to host the 2011 World Championships – which will act as a qualifier for the 2012 Olympics – on the Associations 100 th birthday. 17. Irish team manager Jim Walsh, a Limerick man, won the Philips manager of the month award – the second Munster man in a row to claim the award after Sunderland boss Roy Keane – for June 2007, after Ken Egan, Darren Sutherland and Roy Sheahan won three gold medals at the 2007 EU Championships at the National Stadium in Dublin. 18. Boxing was introduced as a modern Olympic sport for the first time at the 1904 Games in St Louis Missouri but the USA was the only nation to enter a team. 19. Two boxers of Irish extraction, George Finnegan and Miles Burke, contested one of the first boxing finals at the 1904 Games – Finnegan winning the flyweight decider. 20. Boxing is Ireland’s most successful Olympic sport as boxers have won nine out of twenty medals won by Irish athletes. 3 Profiles of Ireland’s Olympic Boxers Ken Egan (Captain) Age: 26 Club: Neilstown Dublin Weight Category: 81Kg (Light Heavyweight) Major Titles: Irish Senior Champion 2000/01/02/03/04/05/06/07/08 European Union Gold Medallist 2005/2007/08 European Championships Bronze Medallist World Ranking: 4th European Ranking: 2 nd Stance: Southpaw Irish captain Ken Egan, remarkably, has yet to be beaten in Irish competition this century as he has won Irish senior titles for the last eight years in a row. The 26 year old, from Neilstown in Dublin, is one of Ireland's most decorated athletes having won medals in almost every tournament he has entered internationally and domestically over nearly a decade. Ken claimed a bronze medal at the 2006 European Championships in Plovdiv, Bulgaria after he was beaten by Russian light heavyweight Arthur Beterbiev, who is currently ranked number two in the World and number one in Europe. The Russians, who many believe will top the medal table in the boxing event in Beijing, advanced eleven boxers into the eleven finals at the European Championships, winning a phenomenal nine gold and two silver medals. Ken has also finished on top of the podium at the European Union Championships three times, winning gold in 2008, 2007 (National Stadium Dublin) and in 2005. Ken qualified for the 2008 Olympics at the final Olympic qualifier for European boxers in Athens in April 2008, after reaching the 81Kg semi final, where he beat Germany’s Gotllieb Wess (boxers reaching their finals in Athens qualified automatically for Beijing) en route to capping an impressive tournament with a gold medal win over Sweden's, Kennedy Katende. Securing Olympic qualification was the realisation of a lifetime’s ambition for Ken who missed out on booking his ticket for the 2004 Games in Athens where his close friend Andy Lee was Ireland's sole representative. Ken admitted that being named Irish captain was a very proud moment for him and he has hailed the performances of the entire Irish squad who have been through a long and arduous qualifying campaign throughout the World and Europe over the last year. The Irish skipper acknowledged that the competition will be fierce in Beijing - not least in his own weight division - which incidentally is the only category Cuba did not manage to qualify a boxer. However, Ken is not reading too much into the Cubans absence as he reckons that whoever qualified in Cuba’s place must be better. The Irish captain played some tennis a few years back, but admitted that Wimbledon champion Rafael Nadal would probably have no cause to worry about his on court abilities. "I played a bit of tennis and Gaelic football, but boxing was always my number one sport. I am very proud to be travelling to Beijing as captain of the Irish squad. The entire squad has put an enormous amount of effort in trying to secure as many Olympics places as possible. We have 4 all shed blood, sweat and tears to get to Beijing and some of the lads were very unlucky not to make it and I know exactly how that feels. The squad has been through an awful lot to get where we are and the important thing is that we have stuck together and shared our triumphs and disappointments. There is a great spirit in this squad and we are all eagerly looking forward to the start of the Olympics." * Ukrainian light heavyweight Ismail Sillakh was disqualified from the 2008 Games after a doping violation as confirmed by World amateur boxing chiefs, AIBA. Sillakh, who was ranked 4th in the World, has been replaced by Anastasios Berdesis of Greece, who has since been replaced by Top Five World Amateur Boxers (Light Heavyweight) 1. Abbos Atoyev (Uzbekistan) World Champion 2. Arthur Beterbiev (Russia) European Champion 3. Eleider Alvarez (Columbia) 4. Ken Egan (Ireland) European Union Champion 5. Daugirdas Semiotas (Lithuania) 5 Darren Sutherland Age: 26 Club: St Saviours Olympic Boxing Academy Dublin Weight Category: 75Kg (Middleweight) Major Titles: Irish Senior Champion 2006/07/08 European Union Gold Medallists 2007/08 World Ranking: 8th European Ranking: 3 rd Stance: Orthodox Darren, nicknamed Daz, became the second Irish middleweight to qualify for the Olympics in four years (Andy Lee, Athens 2004) after he booked his ticket for Beijing at the Olympic qualifiers in Athens last April. The fact that he won a gold medal into the bargain was the icing on the cake of what has been a remarkable two years of highs and lows for the reigning Irish senior 75Kg champion who has shown remarkable