Comments Thread For: IOC May Still Exclude Boxing From 2020 Olympic Games

[NEETzsche]

Break this down for me. Are you saying the IOC is paying national Olympic teams to compete in the Olympics? I wasn't really aware of that that I recall.

Why couldn't some World Championships turned into the biggest amateur turnament get some sorta sponsorship/money entity behind them to provide this same service that you are saying the th IOC provides?

What he's trying to say is that countries pump money into sports to win medals at the olympics, as the medal count at the end of the event is a big point of prestige for them. If a sport isn't going to be represented at the olympics that means no medals. If there's no chance of medals then governments might just decide it's not worth it to keep investing a lot in the sport. In the UK they divide up the grassroots sports budget according to how many medals each sport took at the olympics. Sure, there's various other events like the commonwealth games / amateur world championships that can give a return on investment, but olympic gold is the biggest and most coveted prize. If there's no medals on offer for boxing at the olympics then you can expect governments to slash budgets for amateur programs across the entire world.

Yeah, Scopedog explained it. In the UK our amateur boxing program is funded by the National Lottery and the Exchequer, and they primarily seem to care about the Olympics. The increase in public funding we've had since Harrison and Khan is apparently largely responsible for this current "golden age" of British boxing

[Rubber Ducky]

Yeah, Scopedog explained it. In the UK our amateur boxing program is funded by the National Lottery and the Exchequer, and they primarily seem to care about the Olympics. The increase in public funding we've had since Harrison and Khan is apparently largely responsible for this current "golden age" of British boxing

Yeah it was Harrison winning that gold medal at the 2000 Sydney Olympics that changed everything for the amateur game in the UK. They were given a target of one gold medal to receive National Lottery funding for GB boxing and Harrison came through.

Then with all that funding the every next year we saw a GB boxer medal at the world championships for the very first time. Froch won Bronze, Haye won Silver.

Khan came along in 2004 and won silver at the Athens games and of course turned pro with a **** and then in 2008 team GB sent an 8 strong team including 2 future world pro champions in DeGale and Billie Joe Saunders.

As you say the whole golden era for UK boxing right now is due to the funding and success at the Olympics. Nobody really in the UK watches the AIBA world championships it's all about the Olympics which turns young amateurs like Khan and Joshua into household names over night giving them a platform to launch a career in the pro game which brings in more casual fans to boxing from the exposure at the Olympics.

Top GB amateurs get better training facilities than most pro's. Quality trainers like McCracken, physio's, nutritionists, specialist doctors, state of the art training facilities like the English Institute of sport, a salary and they even get meals delivered to their door step to ensure they are getting the proper nutrition.

If the funding for all that goes then you'll see a decline to the sports popularity once the current group of household names retire. There will be no platform for the future stars and many talented young athletes will go to better funded sports.

[gioberi]

This would hit boxing hard as it would kill state funding in the most countries. However constant robberies and prearranged medal counts must end. And I dont see the corruption getting any less under that Uzbek mobster.