[YT]50Fjg4t3xhU[/YT] and also from this site: http://kovalboxer.com/en/text/78-2013-06-24-13-27-20.html – Have you ever had to fight with someone stronger than you? – Yes, once I nearly fainted…. – Tell me about that. – It happened in Minsk. We were told that if we, boxers from Chelyabinsk would had done our best, we would have represented Belarus at the Olympic Games in Athens. The first and the second matches I won. And in the semi-final I had to fight with the boxer from Armenia. At first sight he was a harmless guy with a childish face. But when I attacked the first time, he responded with such a blow, as if the brick hit my head. I thought “Wow!” and the referee didn’t open the score. He had really hard blows, after the first round I was losing 3:7; after the third round the score was 7:15. And in the last fourth round we had a really tough combat: I knocked him down twice and won with the score 30:20, gaining 23 points in one round. I felt dizzy after that, but in the end I won the tournament. I was so exhausted during the final battle; I almost didn’t use my left arm. That Armenian “kid” completely frazzled me out. – And where is this “kid” now? – I haven’t heard anything about him after that tournament in Belarus. – And what went wrong with Belarus? – They had a Dagestani trainer, who preferred his countrymen. --------- So it was in Minsk, perhaps in 2003 or Early 2004. He was the runner up in the tournament, won 30:20 in the semis.
Wouldn't it have been before 2007-2008 if the fighters from his city could've represented Belarus at the Athens Olympics, which were held in 2004? If so, the only tournaments I can find any info about him competing in pre 2004 are Russian national championships and Junior Russian national championships. https://cse.google.com/cse?cx=partn...alev&sa=Search#gsc.tab=0&gsc.q=sergey kovalev http://www.boxing-scoop.com/show_boxer.php?boxer_ID=1402