Kurt Baumgartner

Kurt Baumgartner (born March 29, 1943 in Pfaffenschlag , Lower Austria ) is a former Austrian amateur boxer and Olympic participant from 1968.

Career

Baumgartner was born in the village of Kleingöpfritz in the Pfaffenschlag municipality in the Lower Austrian district of Waidhofen an der Thaya and moved to Vienna at the age of 17 , where he practiced boxing for the police sports association. He also worked as a trained butcher. He was supported by his brother Franz Baumgartner, who also practiced boxing and had become Austrian welterweight champion in 1958. During an international match in Passau , Kurt Baumgartner was brought to Germany by a talent scout in the early 1960s, where he initially boxed for Schramberg and from 1963 for ASV 97 Tuttlingen . In Tuttlingen he also met his future wife and became a father of two.

In 1965, 1966 and 1968 he was Austrian light heavyweight champion. In 1967 there were no national championships, but Baumgartner took part in the light heavyweight division at the European championships in Rome . He was only eliminated on points in the quarterfinals against the Italian Olympic champion from 1964 Cosimo Pinto and thus qualified for participation in the 19th Summer Olympics in Mexico City in 1968 . Although Baumgartner started for Austria, he was awarded a gold ducat by the mayor of his adopted home Tuttlingen, Walter Balz , together with the wrestler Roland Bock , for his participation in the Olympics.

After a bye in the first preliminary round, he met Soungalo Bagayoko from Mali , the silver medalist of the 1966 African Championships, in the second preliminary round . Baumgartner won the fight on points and thus made it to the round of 16, where he won the Italian champions and later Golden Gloves Champion Walter Facchinetti. Baumgartner seemed close to winning the demolition, as Facchinetti had suffered a serious cut injury in the first lap . But in the second round Baumgartner was disqualified by the Australian referee because he hit the Italian with an illegal low blow and the latter apparently could no longer fight. He was eliminated from the games in ninth place, but came to a sparring match against George Foreman in the Olympic Village .

In 1971 Baumgartner finally received German citizenship and boxed until 1978, most recently for the Singen boxing club . He then worked as a porter at the Aesculap works . The 1.75 m tall light heavyweight competed in 305 fights, including 257 wins and 11 draws.

Web links

• Kurt Baumgartner also boxed with Foreman , schwäbische.de
• Olympic series: Tuttlinger boxer Kurt Baumgartner , schwäbische.de
• Kurt Baumgartner in the Olympedia.org database (English)