The Val Barker Trophy is presented every four years to the most "outstanding boxer" at the

Olympic Games The modern Olympic Games (Olympics; ) are the world's preeminent international Olympic sports, sporting events. They feature summer and winter sports competitions in which thousands of athletes from around the world participate in a Multi-s ...

. In theory, the award goes to the top "

pound for pound Pound for pound is a ranking used in combat sports, such as boxing, wrestling, or mixed martial arts, adjusted to compensate for weight class. As fighters in different weight classes do not compete directly, determining the best fighter pound for ...

" boxer in the Olympics. The winner is selected by a committee of International Boxing Association (amateur) (AIBA) officials. The trophy is named after British boxer Val Barker who won the

Amateur Boxing Association of England England Boxing, known until 2013 as the Amateur Boxing Association of England, is the leading Sports governing body, governing body of amateur boxing clubs in England. There are separate organisations for Scotland and Wales with boxing in North ...

(ABA) heavyweight title in 1891, before becoming the secretary of the AIBA between 1926 and 1929. The inaugural recipient of the Val Barker Trophy was American flyweight Louis Laurie who won bronze at the

1936 Summer Olympics The 1936 Summer Olympics (), officially the Games of the XI Olympiad () and officially branded as Berlin 1936, were an international multi-sport event held from 1 to 16 August 1936 in Berlin, then capital of Nazi Germany. Berlin won the bid to ...

in Berlin. He is one of just three boxers who did not win gold at the same Olympics in which they were presented with the trophy, the others being Kenyan featherweight Philip Waruinge (bronze at the 1968 Games) and American light middleweight Roy Jones Jr. (silver at the 1988 Games). In the 2016 Games, two Val Barker Trophies were presented for the first time, one for men and one for women; women's boxing made its Olympic debut at the previous Games in

2012 2012 was designated as: *International Year of Cooperatives *International Year of Sustainable Energy for All Events January *January 4 – The Cicada 3301 internet hunt begins. * January 12 – Peaceful protests begin in the R ...

. The inaugural female winner was middleweight Claressa Shields who became the first American boxer to win two consecutive Olympic gold medals when she defeated Dutch boxer Nouchka Fontijn in Rio de Janeiro. American boxers lead with six trophies, followed by Kazakhstani boxers with three awards and Russian boxers with two awards (one for the Soviet Union and one for Russia).

Recipients

References

External links

Winners of the Val Barker Trophy
at SportsReference.com {{featured list Boxing at the Summer Olympics Awards established in 1936 Boxing awards