Jones hoping for exciting Boxing Champs

The Jamaica Boxing Board has announced that their National Amateur Boxing Championships will take place over three nights from Thursday, January 23 to Saturday January 25, 2020, at the Stanley Couch gym, located on Victoria Avenue in Kingston.

The championships will be open to Jamaican boxers worldwide, and The Gleaner has learnt that several boxers from overseas have already expressed an interest in participating.

Competition is open to boxers between 19 and 40 years of age, and overseas boxers must have a Jamaican passport.

The Olympic weight categories will be used, eight for men and five for women. The male categories are: flyweight 52kg; featherweight 57kg; lightweight 63kg, welterweight 69kg, middleweight 75kg, light heavyweight 81kg; heavyweight 91kg and super heavyweight over 91kg.

The female categories are: flyweight 51kg, featherweight 57kg; lightweight 60kg; welterweight 69kg and Middleweight 75kg.

The importance of the championships is that those crowned champions will be given the opportunity to be considered for inclusion among the boxers who will be participating at the Olympic qualifying tournaments that will be held next year. The qualifying tournament for the Americas will be held in Buenos Aires, Argentina, in March.

There will be another tournament a few months later that will also involve boxers from other continents.

There will be two categories at the championships, Open and Novice, and the Novice Class will be for boxers with no more than five fights.

Board president Stephen Jones says that he is hoping that all the gyms in Jamaica will enter their best boxers so that a very competitive tournament will take place.

OPTIMISTIC

He said that the Boxing Board is hoping to send a team of boxers to the Olympics in Tokyo next year and that the nucleus of that team will come from the boxers who participate in the championships.

“We already have some boxers who have shown by their performances this year that they will have to be given serious consideration,” Jones said.

A squad of boxers will be selected for special training after the championships, and areas such as work ethic, performances in training, and general behaviour will be given consideration in the boardreaching a final decision. The matter of costs will also be a factor he said, as it will be expensive to get boxers to Argentina, and the board is therefore hoping to get private sector support for this effort.

Jones went on to say that the Boxing Board would like to send a large team, as this will be a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity for many of the boxers.