Olympic boxing: Ukraine's Usyk slogs his way to gold

London - Ukraine’s Olexander Usyk slogged his way to Olympic heavyweight boxing gold, winning a bruising final against Italy’s Clemente Russo.

Usyk, the No. 1 seed, repeated his world championship final victory over the Beijing silver medallist to take the sport’s top prize by 14 points to 11 Saturday.

It was Russo who took a cautious opening round 3-1 after landing more accurately.

But Usyk came back fiercely in the second with a knockdown to level it at 8-8 going into the final round.

The Ukrainian pounded his opponent in the final round to take it 6-3 and guarantee gold.

Bulgaria’s Tervel Pulev and Teymur Mammadov of Azerbaijan lost to the two finalists in Friday’s semifinal to each take a bronze medal home.