Mary Kom to skip National Women's Boxing Championships

Mary Kom, who reached the pre-quarters at the Tokyo Olympics, is training for the world championships in December.

Six-time world champion M C Mary Kom will not compete in the upcoming National Women's Boxing Championships in Hisar.

Six-time world champion M C Mary Kom will not compete in the upcoming National Women's Boxing Championships in Hisar from October 21.

The 38-year-old, who reached the pre-quarters at the Tokyo Olympics, is training for the world championships in December.

Even though the Boxing Federation of India (BFI) has announced that only gold medal winners from the Nationals will make the squad, it is reliably learnt that trials could be held in a couple of weight categories, including the 48kg division.

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Olympic bronze-medallist Lovlina Borgohain (69kg) has earned direct entry. Lovlina will also skip the domestic showpiece.

Mary Kom, a multiple-time Asian gold-medallist, has not taken part in any competition since the Tokyo Games. A federation source said she would have given the Nationals a shot if the announcement on world championship selection had come sooner.

The BFI's decision of picking only national gold-winners for the world championships was announced on October 5.

"She would have competed had she known about this earlier. She would have prepared accordingly," the federation said.

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The other two Tokyo Olympians, Simranjeet Kaur (60kg) and Pooja Rani (75kg), will be competing at the nationals.

The women's boxing world championships will be held in Istanbul in early December and will offer total prize money of USD 2.6 million, the same amount as the men's event, which is due to start on October 24 in Belgrade, Serbia.