Pentti Hämäläinen

Pentti Hämäläinen
Data
Birth Name	Pentti Olavi Hämäläinen
Weight class	Bantamweight
nationality	Finnish
birthday	December 19, 1929
place of birth	Kotka
Date of death	December 11, 1984
Place of death	Kotka
Combat Statistics
Struggles	6th
Victories	5
Knockout victories	1
Defeats	1

Hämäläinen (left in the dark jersey) in the international match against Poland in 1954

Pentti Olavi Hämäläinen (born December 19, 1929 in Kotka , Finland , † December 11, 1984 in Kotka) was a Finnish boxer. Hämäläinen was bronze medalist at the 1951 and 1955 European Championships and the 1956 Olympic Games and gold medalist at the 1952 Olympic Games .

amateur

Hämäläinen was Finnish champion in 1950, 1951 and 1959 in flyweight (-51 kg), in 1952 and 1953 in bantamweight (-54 kg) and in 1954 and 1956 featherweight (-57 kg).

At the European Championships in Milan in 1951 , Hämäläinen won the bronze medal in the flyweight division. During these championships he beat u. a. the 1949 European champion Janusz Kasperczak. In 1952 he took part in the Olympic Games in Helsinki , where he won over Thomas Nicholls , United Kingdom (3: 0), Henryk Niedžwiedzki , Poland (3: 0), Lennie von Graevenitz, South African Union (3: 0) and Gennady Garbusow , Soviet Union (3-0), reached the final. He won this with 2-1 judges' votes against the Irishman John McNally and thus the Olympic gold medal in bantamweight.

At the European Championships in Warsaw in 1953, Hämäläinen was already defeated in the quarterfinals against Poland's Zenon Stefaniuk on points. After winning the gold medal in featherweight at the 1st Scandinavian Championships in 1955, he won the bronze medal at the European Championships in West Berlin that same year . Hämäläinen also took part in the 1956 Olympic Games in Melbourne , where he received the bronze medal after victories over Martin Smyth, Ireland , Burhard Schroeter, GDR , and Ján Zachara , Czechoslovakia , and a semi-final defeat against British Thomas Nicholls.

professional

His professional career, started in 1957, lasted only six fights. In his second professional fight in 1958 he defeated Edgar Basel, who was also unbeaten as a professional, on points. After a premature loss to Moroccan Mimoun Ben Ali , he ended his career.

Web links

• Pentti Hämäläinen in the BoxRec database