Lone Filipino Olympic Boxing Qualifier Continues Training

Harry Tanamor, the solo Filipino boxer to fight in Beijing Olympic Games, will leave for Germany's Chemistry Cup on Wednesday as his last international meet warming up to the Olympics in August, a senior sports official said Tuesday.

Manny Lopez, president of the Amateur Boxing Association of the Philippines, said the 29-year-old Olympic veteran boxer is in "great shape" after two-week intensive drill with Mexican counterparts in the national training center in northern Philippine city of Baguio. Lopez said Tanamor will move up from his light flyweight division (48 kilogram) to flyweight division in Halle, Germany for the absence of light flyweight competition during the June 18-22 meet. Bantamweight boxer Charly Suarez, Cuba-trained featherweight Orlando Tacuyan Jr., and light welterweight Genebert Basadre, together with Tanamor, will form the four-men Filipino squad in Germany.

Home to World Boxing Council (WBC) featherweight champion Manny Pacquiao, the Philippines suffered a humiliating defeat in the Beijing Olympic qualification matches. Despite sports officials' expectation of 3-4 qualifiers, only Athen Games veteran Tanamor managed to grab a slot to the Beijing Games.

Tanamor finished at the second place in the light flyweight division of 2007 World Amateur Boxing Championships in Chicago, defeated by Chinese rising star Zou Shiming.
Trained under Cuban coaches Juan Enrique Steyners Tissert and Pat Gaspi, Tanamor won a gold in last month's AIBA (International Boxing Association) President's Cup, which Zou did not attend.