Russian wins Olympic middleweight boxing gold

Russian middleweight Gaydarbek Gaydarbekov rallied from four points down to beat world champion Gennady Golovkin of Kazakhstan 28-18 to seize Russia's second gold in the boxing tournament of the 2004 Athens Olympic Games here Saturday evening.

In a fierce encounter between the 2003 world champion and the 2004 European champion, the valiant and tenacious Russian, who was 2-6 behind in the first round and also trailed by 2 points in the second, staged a strong comeback to take the third and fourth rounds 10-3 and 10-5, establishing a firm lead of 10 points to win the match.

"It was a tough contest. I am very happy," said the Russian after his win. "Four years ago I lost in Sydney. Today I feel like winning the lottery."

He said that he wanted to dedicate the Olympic gold to his three-month-old son.

Suriya Prasathinphimai of Thailand and Andre Dirrell of the United States shared the bronze.

This was the second gold medal in the tournament for the Russians, who had three boxers in the finals of the total 11 categories. Earlier on Saturday evening, featherweight Alexei Tichtchenko beat DPR Korean Kim Song Guk 39-17 on points to clinch a gold for the 57kg category.

With the double victory Saturday in the Peristeri Olympic Boxing Hall, the Russians are almost certain to reap three boxing golds in Athens, one more than they did in Sydney 2000.

Super heavyweight world champion Alexander Povetkin is expected to pocket the gold for the +91kg category without much difficulty in the final scheduled for Sunday afternoon.

The Russians, who had 9 European champions in their 11-member team, suffered several major upsets in the previous rounds and lost the chance to vie for the golds in the light flyweight (48kg), welterweight (69kg) and light heavyweight (81kg) categories, all believed to be their strong fields.

However, they should have found some comfort Saturday evening as they had attained their preset goal of two Olympic golds in the first two finals they played.

And thanks to the excellent performance of their boxers, the Russians have closed in upon the United States and China on the medal tally of the Athens Games. With 22 golds now, Russia is 10 golds behind the leader, the United States, and 7 golds behind the 2nd-placed China when the Games still has one day to go.