Masatsugu Kawachi

Masatsugu Kawachi medal table
Boxing
Japan
World Championship
bronze	2007	Half-worlds
Asian Games
bronze	2014	Half-worlds
Asian Championship
bronze	2009	Half-worlds

Masatsugu Kawachi ( Japanese 川 内 将 嗣 , Kawachi Masatsugu ; born November 25, 1985 in Kashima , Saga Prefecture ) is a Japanese boxer.

Career

The approximately 1.78 m tall southpaw attended Senshū University in Tokyo . He was Japanese welterweight champion in 2005 and Japanese light welterweight champion in 2006, 2007, 2008, 2009, 2011 and 2015. In 2007 and 2009, he was voted Japan's amateur boxer of the year.

At the 2007 World Championships in Chicago , he surprisingly won a bronze light welterweight medal. He defeated it the vice European champion of the cadets Levan Gwamichawa, the European champion Eduard Hambardsumjan , and the two Olympic champions Manus Boonjumnong and Félix Díaz . Only in the semifinals he was eliminated from the later two-time world and Olympic champion Serik Säpijew . He became the first Japanese medalist at world boxing championships since 1978, when Kōki Ishii won bronze in the flyweight division.

He was then qualified for the 2008 Summer Olympics in Beijing , where he was eliminated this time in the first fight against Manus Boonjumnong. In 2009 he won a bronze medal in the light welterweight division at the Asian Championships in China and also took part in the World Championships in Milan in the same year , but lost his first fight there against Egidijus Kavaliauskas . At the 2011 World Cup in Baku he lost in the second fight against Danijar Jeleussinow .

He won another bronze medal at the 2014 Asian Games in South Korea, defeating Manoj Kumar , among others .

Web links

• Masatsugu Kawachi in the Sports-Reference database (English; archived from the original )
• Profile at Asia-Boxing
• Profile at Incheon 2014