While every athlete’s road to the Olympics is long and full of sacrifice, it is hard not to feel that Taiwanese flyweight boxer Huang Hsiao-wen has walked a kilometer further than the rest.
The 23-year-old, who was born into a troubled family environment in Taipei, completed that journey by winning a bronze medal on Wednesday, Taiwan’s first-ever in Olympic boxing.
One of four boxers in Taiwan’s Tokyo delegation, Huang generated considerable buzz by winning 5-0 decisions over Italy’s Giordanna Sorrentino and Serbia’s Nina Radanovic in the second round and quarter-finals respectively.
Photo: AP
With a ticket to the semi-finals, Huang guaranteed herself a medal — since 1970, the International Olympic Committee has awarded bronze medals to both losing semi-finalists in boxing, rather than them competing for third place.
However, she was also the underdog in her high-profile bout against Buse Naz Cakiroglu of Turkey, the world No. 2.
Throughout her impressive run this week, media coverage of Huang has drawn attention to her compelling personal story, often trying to glean some insight from the gallery of tattoos — ranging from a map outline of Taiwan to popular cartoon characters — that decorate her left bicep.
However, in interviews Huang has spoken of the significance of a tattoo on her chest containing words of encouragement from her father: “Boxer girl, remember why you started.”
There was little in Huang’s early years to suggest that she would ever get started in, let alone reach, the competitive peak of a niche sport like women’s boxing.
One year after her birth in 1997, Huang’s parents divorced, and not long after that her father was sent to prison for the first of three sentences for drug-related offenses.
Huang was sent to live with her grandparents, where she was often left on her own for hours at a time while her grandfather drove a taxi to support the family.
As she got older, she struggled in school, prompting warnings from relatives that she was on her way to becoming “a good-for-nothing like her father.”
On entering Taipei’s Lanzhou Junior High School at age 13, Huang recalled that her main ambition was to become a professional basketball player.
When plans to field a team fell through, the school’s boxing coach, Liu Tsung-tai — who would go on to become her trainer and a “second father figure” — urged her to give boxing a try.
From there, Huang never looked back.
After cutting her teeth in a series of youth competitions, she went on to win a bronze medal at the 2018 Asian Games and a gold at the 2019 Women’s World Boxing Championships, ultimately securing a spot at the Tokyo Olympics.
The sport, Huang said, gave her confidence and taught her that “while I can’t change the circumstances I was born into, what I can change is my own fate.”
In her Olympic semi-final bout against Cakiroglu, Huang stumbled badly out of the gate, losing the first round to the Turkish fighter on all five judges’ scorecards.
Her form improved slightly in the second round, which she lost by a close 3-2 score, but she dropped the third in another 5-0 decision.
After the fight, Huang expressed disappointment with her performance, telling reporters that she had been nervous and could have done better.
Despite having lost, Huang said that she felt “extremely honored” to have brought glory to Taiwan by winning the nation’s first-ever Olympic boxing medal.
Noting the media coverage of her family’s past, Huang said that she also wanted to send a message to her father.
“I want to tell him, regardless of what he did in the past, that he’ll always be my pillar of strength. I take pride in him and I hope that he is proud of me, too,” she said.
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