AIBA President Dr Ching-Kuo Wu has released a message looking back on the year that was in amateur boxing, and also looking ahead to next year’s Rio 2016 Olympics. Take a look at his full message below:
It is gratifying to look back over another groundbreaking year for AIBA, during which we have continued to look for ways to develop boxing, protecting our athletes and pushing our sport into new areas whilst never losing its noble spirit.
Taking the AIBA World Championships to the Middle East for the first time was an important element of that ethos. The impact of the Doha 2015 competition and the quality of the event will be felt in Qatar and beyond for years to come as the Qatar Boxing Federation continues to invest in the sport, and we look forward to many more tournaments in the region in the future. The standard of competition and the global coverage it generated was a fitting tribute to the hard work put in by the boxers, their teams and those working behind the scenes, and once again we saw exciting fresh talent emerge in emphatic fashion, and history being made for Ireland and Morocco.
It was at those 2015 World Boxing Championships that AIBA took the opportunity to launch the HeadsUp! programme, part of our ongoing commitment to providing the best possible platform for health and sustainability of our sportsmen and women and their careers. Our commitment to their health is exemplified by the tireless research carried out by the AIBA Medical Commission around the removal of headguards in the men’s competitions, and HeadsUp! provides the blueprint for top-down education of boxers, coaches and officials to encourage a more upright stance when boxing.
The World Series of Boxing provided us with another gripping season, as the Astana Arlans Kazakhstan and Cuba Domadores showed exactly why our unique team competition has caught the imaginations of boxing fans the world over. Their final back in June will be difficult to top in 2016 and we eagerly await their efforts.
It was thrilling to see two APB athletes on the undercard of one of the year’s highest-profile matches, Klitschko vs Fury in Dusseldorf as well as two APB bouts on the undercard of Usyk vs Rodriguez event as part of AIBA’s continuous cooperation with K2 promotions. It was also great to see Robson Conceição delight his fans in Brazil at December’s Rio 2016 Test Event.
I would like to thank all of you for being with us in 2015 and I look forward to achieving greater success together for the development of boxing worldwide in 2016.
Good luck to all of our boxers whether they are pursuing 2016 Olympic gold or laying the first foundations for long and successful careers.
