AMIDST the persistent showers on Thursday, Barbados hosted the International Amateur Boxing Association (AIBA) Women’s World Boxing Championships at the Wildey Gymnasium with some deserved pride and fanfare.
It is the biggest-ever women’s boxing competition – the sixth edition of the AIBA Women’s World Championships, and began here on Thursday and will end on September 18. It must be a source of some pride for the organisers who have done a good job so far.
The first Women’s World Championships was held in the United States in 2001, followed by Turkey, Russia, India, and China as the last venue in 2008. The championships now come to the Caribbean for the first time. That the organisers have been able to pull this off is even more spectacular.
There are 65 nations and 267 boxers who will be competing, and these numbers break every former record in women’s boxing history. This will also be the biggest boxing tournament to be held in the South Caribbean region.
After five outstanding World Championships, AIBA prepares to hold its sixth edition of the championships. Boxers between the ages of 19 and 34 will compete and though Barbados is not expected to work miracles we would encourage all Barbadians to come out and support our girls.
This is the first time the competition is being held since the International Olympic Committee’s (IOC) decision to include women’s boxing in the Olympic Games.
Though not a sport which carries a high profile in Barbados, it is indeed a significant achievement for a small country to be given the opportunity to make its mark in the growing field of sport tourism and to make a mark in the international arena.
Over the next week or so intense focus and publicity will be given to Barbados as a sporting destination and will augur well for young women because women’s boxing has now been made an Olympic sport. This should now provide many opportunities for those who are minded to pursue the sport.
President of the local organising committee and president of the Barbados Amateur Boxing Association, Joyce Bowen, could feel vindicated as she had a Herculean task in making sure preparations went smoothly. She deserves our profound gratitude.
This clearly was not lost on president of AIBA, Ching-Kuo Wu, who thanked both Minister of Sports Stephen Lashley and the team for the preparatory work and indicated that the approval of women’s boxing by the IOC is a great encouragement to the development of the sport.
We know there are many who do not support this sport for women and consider it too dangerous, but the AIBA Technical & Competition Rules provide very safe guidelines which worldwide AIBA boxing members and family must follow and respect in any of their competitions and activities at all levels.
Let the bouts continue!
