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5:16 pm on 13 November 2022, Sunday
Romeo Braceros Jr.
Photo: PH Boxing News
Former Cagayan de Oro City garbage scavenger Carlo Paalam helped the Philippines bring home a gold medal from the ASBC Asian Elite Boxing Championships in Amman, Jordan.
On Saturday, November 12, Paalam defeated top seed Makhmud Sabyrkhan of Kazakhstan in the men's bantamweight finals by a 4-1 split decision score.
After winning the bantamweight silver at the AIBA World Boxing Championships in Belgrade, Serbia, in 2021, Sabyrkhan entered the title fight as the favorite.
But Paalam took the lead right away, receiving five judges' scores of exactly 10-9 in the first round, and he held off a strong push from Sabyrkhan in the final two frames to win the match.
Paalam received a 30-27 rating from the United Arab Emirates judge, but the judges from India, Slovakia, and Ireland gave the Filipino the win with the same 29-28 ratings.
Only the Italian judge gave Sabyrkhan a 29–28 victory.
A year after winning the men's flyweight silver medal at the Tokyo Olympics in Japan, Paalam moved up to bantamweight.
The Mindanaoan boxer, however, was unaffected by the weight class switch as he won three straight unanimous decision contests en route to the finals.