Heavyweight (≤91 kilograms), Men

Cuba’s Félix Savón came to Barcelona having won the last three World Championships – 1986, 1989, 1991; the 1987 and 1991 Pan American Games; and the 1986 and 1990 Central American and Caribbean Games. There was no heavier favorite in boxing at the 1992 Olympics. He won his first two matches easily and then faced the United States’ Danell Nicholson in the quarter-finals, and was surprisingly pressed by the little-known American. Nicholson led 8-6 after two rounds, but Savón pulled out the victory in the final round, winning 13-11. Savón then defeated the Netherlands’ Arnold Vanderlijde for the eighth consecutive time, and won the gold medal with an easy decision over Nigeria’s David Izonritei, the 1991 All-Africa Games champion. Vanderlijde came to Barcelona having won the bronze medal at the 1984 and 1988 Olympics in this class, and through 2008 is still the only Olympic boxer to have won three bronze medals. He was European Amateur Champion in 1987, 1989, and 1991.

Savón would return in 1996 and 2000 to win three consecutive gold medals in Olympic boxing, matching the feats of Hungary’s László Papp and his countryman, Teófilo Stevenson. He would also win the world amateur championship again in 1993, 1995, and 1997, to record six consecutive world titles. He took silver in 1999, but only after making the final and having to withdraw when the Cubans withdrew their entire team in protest over some controversial decisions. Savón also won the Pan American Games again in 1995, and added golds at the Central American and Caribbean Games in 1993 and 1998.