Five Europeans claimed the gold medals in the Ulan-Ude AIBA Women’s World Boxing Championships

The Ulan-Ude 2019 AIBA Women’s World Boxing Championships has finished with its tenth competition day in Russia. Russia’s trio Ekaterina Paltseva, Liliya Ayetbayeva and Zenfira Magomedalieva, furthermore Turkey’s Busenaz Surmeneli and Wales’ Lauren Price claimed the five European gold medals in Ulan-Ude.

Altogether 17 Europeans from nine nations won at least one medal in Ulan-Ude out of the possible 40 podium places. The European continent have 11 finalists and among them five won the titles of the AIBA Women’s World Boxing Championships.

The following 24 European nations have attended in the Ulan-Ude 2019 AIBA Women’s World Boxing Championships in Yekaterinburg: Armenia, Austria, Azerbaijan, Belarus, Belgium, Bulgaria, Croatia, Czech Republic, Denmark, England, Estonia, Finland, France, Georgia, Germany, Hungary, Ireland, Israel, Italy, Lithuania, Moldova, Monaco, Netherlands, Poland, Romania, Russia, Scotland, Serbia, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Turkey, Ukraine and Wales.

Bout of the day

Turkey’s Busenaz Surmeneli won the AIBA Women’s Youth World Boxing Championships in Taipei four and half years ago and following her youth and U22 titles, she worked hard to reach the final of the Ulan-Ude event. The 21-year-old Turkish boxer had to meet in the final of the welterweight (69kg) with China’s Yang Liu who replaced AIBA Women’s World Boxing Championships silver medallist and ASBC Asian Women’s Champion Gu Hong this time. The Chinese boxer, who claimed gold at the Cologne Boxing World Cup, was a strong rival for Surmeneli but the younger Turkish was able to handle all tactical challenges in the day of the finals. Surmeneli was motivated and she did not look nervous in their final which meant her strong attacks delivered for her career highlight in Ulan-Ude.

Surprise of the day

Russia’s Liliya Ayetbayeva had tough national rivals this year but she was able to beat former AIBA Women’s World Champion veteran Elena Saveleva and EUBC European Women’s Champion Svetlana Soluianova as well. Following her gold medal in the National Championships, she had incredible successes over Vietnam’s ASBC Asian Women’s Champion Nguyen Thi Tam and DPR Korea’s defending champion Pang Chol Mi during her road to the finals. For the title Ayetbayeva attacked strongly and surprisingly defeated Turkey’s Busenaz Cakiroglu who lost her first fight this year.

The Round-Up

Russia’s Ekaterina Paltseva is a 22-year-old talent who has been involved to the international events still back in 2012 as a junior boxer. Her career highlight was a gold medal at the Sofia 2018 EUBC European Women’s Boxing Championships but in the recent 15 months she was not in to shape. The 22-year-old Russian eliminated England’s new sensation Demie-Jade Resztan in the semi-finals and met for the title of the light flyweight (48kg) with India’s 20-year-old Manju Rani. Paltseva delivered her best performance with perfect timing and she was slightly better than her Indian rival overcoming Rani with good technique and claimed Russia’s first gold in Ulan-Ude.

Netherlands’ No.1, Rio 2016 Olympic Games silver medallist and AIBA Women’s World Boxing Championships runner-up Nouchka Fontijn lost to Wales’ Lauren Price in the final of the Minsk 2019 European Games this June which was her first European loss since 2016.  The Dutch middleweight (75kg) star had the strong will to do revenge for her previous loss but Price won their contest once again which was the narrowest one of the day.

Russia’s Zenfira Magomedalieva was AIBA Women’s World Champion in 2014 and following a few years of break she returned to the world of boxing. The Russian veteran claimed the gold medal at the Madrid 2019 EUBC European Women’s Boxing Championships and for Ulan-Ude she moved down to the light heavyweight (81kg). Magomedalieva was patient in her final against Turkey’s multiple AIBA medallist Elif Guneri and waited for the best attacking angles when she landed tough jabs. The Turkish boxer was aggressive but Magomedalieva was technically and tactically better to win Russia’s third gold medal.