• Submitted by: lena campos
• Sports
• 06 / 01 / 2013

---

Cuba prepares for 2014 a three-day international tournament in honor of the World and Olympic champion Teofilo Stevenson, considered the best fighter in the history of amateur boxing, a sports official said here Thursday.

Alejandro Barrientos, vice president of the Cuban Federation of Sports Referees and Judges, said the plan is to invite squads from Russia, Ukraine and Kazakhstan to contest along with the hosting island.

He cleared out that the meeting has not a scheduled date yet, but the sports authorities want to hold it days before the traditional Giraldo Cordova Cardin tournament, so the visiting teams could participate in two local competitions.

The President of the National Sports Institute, (INDER) Christian Jimenez stated that inviting the best boxers in the world for the competition will pay a real tribute to Stevenson.

Cuba holds this week the first edition of the Stevenson tournament, but only attended by locals in his birth province of Las Tunas (east), mainly by boxers in the super heavy weight divisions.

Teofilo Stevenson Lawrence died on June 11, 2012 of a heart attack, aged 60.

He achieved all the titles of the International Association of Amateur Boxing (AIBA), and won 301 of the 321 fights he held in his 20-year career, including Olympic gold medals in three Games - Munich 1972, Montreal 1976 and Moscow 1980, and world championship titles in 1974, 1978 and 1986.

Source: xinhua