MY JOURNEY WITH THE VENEZUELAN OLYMPIC TEAM OF BOXING TO ROMANIA
During the year 1975 I had to travel to the city of Bucharest with the national amateur boxing team of Venezuela to attend the international tournament "Cinturón de Oro". It was a pre-Olympic competition that served as preparation for many of the countries that the following year were going to participate in the Olympic Games in Montreal, in Canada.
I was a member of the Venezuelan Amateur Boxing Federation and I was selected by the Board of Directors to fulfill the role of Head of the Delegation composed of nine boxers headed by the then world runners-up in the Flyweight category, Alfredo Pérez and the Light Middleweight Alfredo Lemus.
My stay in Romania was a great experience, a country that belonged at the time to the orbit of the Soviet Union in which the political system called Marxism Leninism or communism prevailed. The first experience that I had to live was at the airport in Bucharest where our representation arrived, the authorities retained the fighter Ernesto Sánchez for carrying a bullet embedded in his key ring. They considered that if he carried a bullet then he also carried a revolver. I had to explain that in Venezuela people, by habit, kept all kinds of pieces, including a projectile, as a souvenir.
Solved this situation we went to the hotel where we had to stay. There I had the opportunity to meet who has been considered the Best Amateur Boxer of all times, the Cuban Teófilo Stevenson. In fact he won the gold medal of the full weight in this pugilistic contest.
In the course of the competition we received the visit of the then ambassador of Venezuela in that European country, Juan Uslar Pietri, brother of the qualified writer and politician Arturo Uslar Pietri. He accompanied us in the boxing programs and organized a meeting at the Embassy's headquarters for the enjoyment of our delegation.
The result of the performance of our compatriots is summarized in the conquest of three medals, one gold and two silver with what we were considered as the great surprise of the event that brought together the intervention of representatives of more 15 countries on four continents, Alfredo Lemus the Light Middleweight who came to the event with the endorsement of being World Runner-up took possession of the gold medal after beating three rivals from Romania and one from Poland, while Fulgencio Obelmejias and Ernesto Sánchez were awarded with the silver award in the Medium and Semi-heavy divisions, respectively. The truth is that it was an enriching experience that joins many others that are part of my life in the world of Sports ... See you later
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