Indian Olympic medal-winning boxer MC Mary Kom will be the face of the upcoming World Championships, the International Boxing Association announced today. The 33-year-old, who won bronze at the Olympic Games in London after being the only Indian woman to qualify for the tournament, told the Press Trust of India it was “a great honour for me as an Indian.”
She is among a number of ambassadors from different countries, and part of a list that includes Briton Nicola Adams, American light flyweight Marlen Esparza, Adriana Arauja of Brazil, who will host the Olympics this year, Moroccan Khadija Mardi, and Bulgaria’s Stanimira Petrova.
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“This title means that I will be representing international boxing and this is an honour which is not given to everybody,” the 51kg flyweight told assembled press.
Mary missed out on an Olympic qualifying spot at last month’s Asian and Oceanic Olympic qualifying tournament in China, but will have another opportunity to secure an Olympic berth at a qualifying event in Astana, Kazakhstan, scheduled for the 18th and 19th of May.
The tournament in Kazakhstan sees 12 Olympic quota spots available for the taking, and will be Mary Kom’s final chance to qualify for the Olympics. If she is successful, this will be her second successive Olympic attempt – and again, she will be the only Indian female boxer to qualify.
Shiva Thapa is the only Indian boxer to have qualified for the Olympics so far, beating Kazakhstan’s Kairat Yeraliyev at the semi-finals of the AIBA Asian and Oceanic Olympic qualifiers in Qian’an, China.
The 22-year-old had earlier qualified for the 2012 London Olympics, and at 18, was the youngest Indian boxer to do so. He crashed out in the first round of the event, however, with a loss to Oscar Valdez Fierro of Mexico.
Laishram Devendro Singh also progressed to the semi-finals at the qualifying event in China, but lost to the top-seeded Roger Ladon of the Philippines.
