Moreover, the lithe champion boxer has done it all, winning medals at the Olympics, the Asian and the World championships, all in a span of just over four years. Lovlina Borgohain’s rise has been nothing short of meteoric.
Lovlina’s Journey
The journey from a small village in Assam to international podiums, however, took this young boxer more than the streak of over four years in which she won a plethora of medals. It is a story of grit and determination which is amazing, to say the least.
Lovlina was born on October 2, 1997, in a small and remote village called Baromukhia in the Golaghat district of Assam. During the period of her childhood, the Borgohain family struggled to make ends meet but that did not stop Lovlina’s father from supporting his three girls’ sporting ambitions.
Lovlina and her two elder sisters started out by learning Muay Thai, a form of kick-boxing. Both her siblings even competed at the national level in Muay Thai while Lovlina took up boxing, where she found her true calling.
Lovlina talent caught the eyes of Padum Boro while attending a Sports Authority of India (SAI) boxing trial at her school in 2012. Boro eventually became her childhood coach. Later, she started taking lessons from the chief coach of women’s boxing Shiv Singh.
Padum Boro recalled during an interview, “I took a few tests of her like punching bag, fast punching and she did well on those parameters. I thought she could be made into a boxer.” His hunch was proved right, and how.
Following her foray in the school boxing trials, Lovlina moved to the SAI centre in Guwahati for better training and the results soon started showing.
As a 16-year-old, Lovlina won the junior national championship in 2012 and was soon making waves internationally, starting with the silver medal at the 2013 Nation’s Women’s Junior Cup in Serbia.
Being tall from a young age, Lovlina Borgohain was used to fighting in higher weight divisions. So even after she moved from the 70kg to 75kg category, her exploits in the ring continued. She had a medal finish at the 2014 Nation’s Women’s Youth Cup and followed it up with a silver medal at the next edition.
After making her mark in the junior circuit, Lovlina switched back to the welterweight class (69kg) in the senior level. She announced her arrival on the senior circuit by winning the bronze medal on her Asian championships debut in 2017. Lovlina enjoyed an impressive run from 2017, starting with medals at the Asian championships and the President’s Cup in the same year. She received a bronze medal at the Asian Women’s Championships in 2017 and at World Championships in 2018. Moreover, she won a silver medal at second India Open International Boxing Tournament and secured the third rank in the 69 kg welterweight category. Lovlina Borgohain’s purple patch saw her winning back-to-back bronze medals at the world championships in 2018 and 2019 before the run was cut short by the COVID-19 pandemic
Her foray into the international stage
A big breakthrough in her career came in the year 2018. Following the gold at the India Open, Lovlina was chosen by the Boxing Federation of India (BFI) to represent India at the 2018 Commonwealth Games in Gold Coast, Australia, in the welterweight division.
Even though she lost to eventual gold medallist Sandy Ryan of England in the quarter-finals, the bout taught Lovlina about the importance of mental preparation in the sport.
She admitted later, “I had prepared very well, be it technique or fitness, going into that event. And when I lost, it was mentally draining for me. I took to meditation to improve my psyche and it also helped me strategize in between bouts. I started performing better after that.”
It was this approach which helped Lovlina pick up a bronze on her world championship debut in 2018, beating former world silver medallist Kaye Scott of Australia in the quarters and collecting a medal.
In 2019, Lovlina stamped her authority as the best female Indian boxer in her division, after she won gold at the national championship.
The BFI bet big on her winning run, handing Lovlina a direct entry to the world championship in 2019. Lovlina vindicated the decision after the Assam boxer emulated her podium finish from the previous world meet, winning another bronze medal.
Lovlina’s Olympics triumph
Despite her wins on the international stage, medals at the world and continental competitions could not satiate Lovlina’s hunger for success. She wanted the biggest prize- to win at the Olympics. She said it had been her parents' dream and she worked hard to realise it.
Lovlina took the initial step towards the dream by securing a Tokyo 2020 berth with a bronze-medal finish in the 2020 Asia & Oceania Boxing Olympic qualifiers. In 2020, Lovlina Borgohain secured the Olympics berth in the 69 kg category with a 5-0 win against Maftunakhon Melieva at the Asia and Oceania Boxing Olympic Qualification tournament after reaching the top four at the Asian boxing Olympic qualifiers in Amman, Jordan. With this victory, she ensured herself a place in the women’s welterweight category at the Tokyo Olympics 2020. She joined the nine-member Indian boxing contingent at the Tokyo Olympics.
Lovlina Borgohain is the first woman athlete from Assam to qualify for the Tokyo Olympics. In terms of boxing at the Olympics, she is also the second boxer to represent the country after Shiva Thapa, and third overall after M C Mary Kom.
Lovlina’s run of dream debuts continued at the Tokyo 2020 Olympics too. Lovlina started her Tokyo Olympics campaign with a hard-fought 3-2 split decision victory over world championship medallist Nadine Apetz from Germany in the round of 16.
Only one win separated Lovlina from getting an Olympic medal. After ousting Germany’s Nadine Apetz in the opening round, Lovlina Borgohain took on Chen Nien-chin – the former world champion boxer she had failed to defeat in the last three attempts. However, this time it was the Indian that was last left standing and Lovlina stepped out of the ring victorious. The Indian boxer used her height advantage and landed some heavy hooks and jabs to make her way to the semi-finals with the win over Chen Nien-chin.
Lovlina Borgohain was unrelenting and defeated Chen Nien-chin 4-1 in the quarters to confirm her first medal at the Summer Games. She brought home the bronze medal, the first Assamese athlete to do so. Even though Lovlina eventually went down fighting her best to world No.1 and reigning world champion Busenaz Surmeneli in the semi-finals, her bronze was no mean achievement. India has only managed a handful of medals at the Olympics, in spite of being the second most populous country in the world.
With this win, Lovlina Borgohain became the third Indian boxer to win an Olympic medal, joining the legendary MC Mary Kom and Vijender Singh.
Staying true to her resolute personality, Lovlina Borgohain has her eyes set on Paris 2024 and will be aiming to improve the colour of her Olympic medal.
Lovlina- the World Champion
Tokyo Olympics bronze medallist Lovlina (75kg) claimed her maiden World gold at the IBA Women’s World Boxing Championship with a 5-2 win on points after the bout against Caitlin Parker of Australia was reviewed.
Competing in her first World Championships final, Lovlina faced a tough challenge against the two-time Commonwealth Games medallist Parker but produced a world-class display to come out on top in the closely contested matchup.
The bout went to and fro with the Indian edging out her opponent with a 3-2 margin in the first round before the Australian came back to prevail in the next round by 4-1. Ultimately, the 25-year-old Assam-born pugilist utilized her vast experience and supreme technical ability to outpunch her opponent and add secure her third Worlds medal
Lovlina Borgohain won a contentious 5-2 decision against Australia’s Caitlin Parker to claim her first ever Women’s World Boxing Championship gold medal. The middleweight Assam boxer was awarded the fight 3-2 in a split decision. She then got two points from the evaluator and the observer under IBA’s new bout review system.
As for Lovlina, luck may have played its part in her bout. The judges scored the contest in her favour and so did the evaluator and observer, despite comments about a shaky performance and an especially poor third round. She had recently made the move to the 75-kg weight category as her previous weight was not a part of the 2024 Paris Olympics boxing programme. Before this win, her trophy cabinet was adorned with two World Championship bronze medals and an Olympic bronze, all in the 69-kg category.
This makes her triumph at the World Championships all the more special.
Awards & Plaudits
The Assamese ace pugilist Lovlina Borgohain was also presented the Arjuna Award in 2020, the highest sporting award conferred on Indian sportspersons. She was conferred with the Arjuna Award in 2020 for her outstanding performance in boxing and became the sixth personality from Assam to win the prestigious award.
After she claimed her maiden World gold at the IBA Women’s World Boxing Championship, the Assam government announced a cash reward of Rs 50 lakh for ace pugilist Lovlina Borgohain.
Announcing the reward in the Assam Assembly on Wednesday, Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma said, “Under the state’s sports policy, the Assam government has announced a reward of Rs 50 lakh for Lovlina.”
“Lovlina Borgohain has made us (Assam) proud and the Assam assembly is thankful to Lovlina for her contribution,” CM Sarma added.
Earlier, Prime Minister Narendra Modi congratulated Lovlina Borgohain, posting “Congratulations @LovlinaBorgohaifor her stupendous feat at the Boxing World Championships. She showed great skill. India is delighted by her winning the Gold medal.”
Lovlina’s dream
The medal-winning feat put Lovlina Borgohain amongst some of the greatest boxers in the world that have won an Olympic medal as well as a world championship medal.
But Lovlina is determined to change the colour of the medal at Paris 2024 before she switches to professional boxing.
“My ultimate target is to win gold in Paris… I like professional boxing a lot. I had thought that if I win gold in Tokyo I will shift to professional boxing. But I stopped at bronze. So, in Paris, the target is gold. After that, I can join professional boxing," Lovlina revealed.
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