The Africa Qualification Tournament gets underway this weekend in Dakar, the capital city of Senegal, when 265 boxers from 43 countries will compete for a place at next year’s Olympic Games.
Taking place at the Dakar Arena from Saturday 9 September until Friday 15 September, the qualifying tournament will see 175 men and 90 women compete across 13 different weight divisions for 18 places at Paris 2024.
It is the second of five continental qualifying tournaments for the Paris 2024 Olympic Games.
The European qualifier was held at the European Games in Krakow, Poland in June and July of this year. Following Dakar, the Asia Qualification Tournament will be held at the 19th Asian Games in Hangzhou, China (23 September – 8 October 2023); the Americas Qualification Tournament will take place at the 2023 Pan American Games in Santiago, Chile (20 October – 5 November 2023) and the Oceania Qualification Tournament will be part of the 2023 Pacific Games in Honiara in the Soloman Islands (27 November – 2 December 2023).
These will be followed by two final World Qualification Tournaments in 2024. The first will take place in Busto Arisizio, on the outskirts of Milan, Italy, (29 February – 12 March 2024) and the second and last Boxing Qualification Tournament will be held in Bangkok, Thailand (23 May – 3 June 2024).
An overall total of 248 Olympic quota places will be allocated across the five qualifying events, with 18 up for grabs in Dakar – 11 for women and seven for men.
The Dakar Arena will already be well-known to many of the athletes taking part. The venue, on the outskirts of the capital, hosted the African qualifying tournament ahead of the Tokyo 2020 Games – an Olympics which saw Ghana’s Samuel Takyi win bronze in the men’s featherweight division after beating Ecuador’s Jean Caicedo and Ceiber Ávila of Colombia on his way to the semi-final.
Many of the athletes gathering in Senegal this weekend will have ambitions of following in Takyi’s footsteps by first qualifying for Paris and then securing a place on the podium.
Among those competing Dakar is Moroccan middleweight Khadija El-Mardi, who reached the quarter finals in Rio 2016 and qualified for Tokyo four years later but had to withdraw after giving birth. She is now back in the ring and determined to impress.
Algeria’s Roumaysa Boualam will be looking to reach her second Olympics Games in the women’s 50kg class, having previously qualified for Tokyo.
Elsewhere, Dakar local Pape Mamadou Sow Jr. will have the hopes of the home nation on his shoulders when he competes in the men’s 51kg weight category. His father, who shares the same name, is a national hero in Senegal as the first Senegalese boxer to become African Champion. Injury prevented him achieving his dream of competing at an Olympics, but Pape Mamadou Sow Jr. can count on local support in his bid to make it all the way to Paris.
The draw and all results at the Africa Qualification Tournament can be viewed at – https://boxing.athlete365.org/2023-africa-qualification-tournament/
World Boxing will be posting news and updates throughout the tournament on its official Instagram, Facebook and Twitter channels:
• https://www.facebook.com/OfficialWorldBoxing
• https://twitter.com/RealWorldBoxing
• https://www.instagram.com/officialworldboxing/