How do fighters qualify for US Olympic Trials?

[Joson]

I have always been a tad mixed up about this.

Of course I realize that US national champions, meaning Golden Gloves or AAU or whatever, qualify for the Olympic Trials box-offs. But I've often heard fighters are "invited" to the Olympic Trials, and that confuses me.

Can someone explain how this works?

Also, does anyone know how many fighters typically participate in any given weight class at the Olympic Trials? Maybe two or three? Maybe eight?

[JMac]

USA Boxing had messed this up big time in my opinion. There used to be 8 boxers in each weight class. 2 from the US Championships, National PAL champ, National GG champ, Eastern trial winner, western trial winner, Armed Forces champ and I think the last one came from a last chance tournament.
It was a double elimination tournament. If you lost, you went into the losers bracket and the winner of the losers bracket boxed the winner of the trials. If the loser bracket winner lost to the trials winner, that's 2 loses and the trials winner was on the team. If the loser bracket winner beats the trials winner, they boxed again and the winner made the team. Now there is no national Pal tournament or Armed Forces tournament. They have the US Championships, National GG's and a bunch of other qualifiers. The most BS part is now they have an High Performance team who have won various tournaments and earned points. They are considered the highest ranked boxer and don't even have to box in the next Olympic trials. The trials is really for who will be the alternate for the team which is total BS. It's how they get ranked in camps and other tournaments which is real BS but I won't get all into it. I think I even heard they may up it to 16 boxers for each weight class in the trials which also doesn't make sense and is a waste of time and money to determine the alternate.

[Joson]

USA Boxing had messed this up big time in my opinion. There used to be 8 boxers in each weight class. 2 from the US Championships, National PAL champ, National GG champ, Eastern trial winner, western trial winner, Armed Forces champ and I think the last one came from a last chance tournament.
It was a double elimination tournament. If you lost, you went into the losers bracket and the winner of the losers bracket boxed the winner of the trials. If the loser bracket winner lost to the trials winner, that's 2 loses and the trials winner was on the team. If the loser bracket winner beats the trials winner, they boxed again and the winner made the team. Now there is no national Pal tournament or Armed Forces tournament. They have the US Championships, National GG's and a bunch of other qualifiers. The most BS part is now they have an High Performance team who have won various tournaments and earned points. They are considered the highest ranked boxer and don't even have to box in the next Olympic trials. The trials is really for who will be the alternate for the team which is total BS. It's how they get ranked in camps and other tournaments which is real BS but I won't get all into it. I think I even heard they may up it to 16 boxers for each weight class in the trials which also doesn't make sense and is a waste of time and money to determine the alternate.

Thanks for the comprehensive answer. I have some more questions.

I thought that, for generations, the only two national amateur tournaments were Golden Gloves and AAU. I see you indicate Golden Gloves. But what about AAU? Did that disappear or has it been renamed?

PAL means Police Athletic League, correct? How is that national tournament tiered. For example, is there a local PAL tourney, the winners of which proceed to a regional tourney, culminating with the regional winners proceeding to a national championship tournament? Or is it organized differently?

You mention the "US Championships." I always thought that was the same as national Golden Gloves championships and national AAU championships, but I must be wrong. Can you explain the "US Championships? How is do fighters qualify for this tourney?

[JMac]

The AAU was in charge of a bunch of Olympic sports back in the day. Around 1984, they broke up the AAU and each Olympic sport had to form their own governing body. In boxing, they called themselves USA/ABF but that later got changed to USA Boxing. The US Championships is what was the National AAU championships. For the longest time, to get to the US Championships, you had to win your LBC (local boxing committee) tournament, then go to the regionals that was made up of like 6 LBCs. If you won that, you got an all expense paid trip to the US Olympic Training Center for the nationals. Now they have a bunch of qualifying tournaments around the country and the US Championships are held in different cities and you pay your own way there. The PAL is the Police Athletic league. They used to have local tournaments that led to the national PAL but that tournament is no longer as is the Armed Forces.
Amateur boxing is dying in the US. They don't get on TV anymore even though there are lots of sports channels on TV. It used to be on TV like once a month when there was only like 5 TV channels. They keep making new rules that are killing amateur boxing on the local level. Now we have the US, Great Britain and a bunch of other European countries who have broken away from the corrupt international governing body that is now called IBA. It used to be AIBA. The IOC is fed up with boxing and probably prefer to get rid of it from the Olympics. As I said, amateur boxing is dying and that sucks just like pro boxing is dying because of greedy bastards.

[Mighty Atom]

Out of interest, how exactly are the US going to pick their team for the Olympic qualifying tournaments?

Are US Boxing just going to pick who they want, is there going to be a single trials and the winner competes in all the qualifiers until they qualify, or will there be trials for each individual tournament?

[JMac]

It's already done. They have their High Performance team who they will enter in the Olympic qualifying tournaments starting with the Pan Am Games which happens before the so called Olympic trials. Basically the US Olympic trials is for who will be the No 2, the alternate. The High Performance team was picked based on previous tournaments and but also more on how they did in camps and subjective decision making by the coaching staff. It's a BS way of determine the Olympic team. I see lawsuits coming. I think a lot of good boxers who possibly could have won the trials with everybody competing won't bother and just go pro.

[Mighty Atom]

So if an American qualifies at the Pan-Ams, the US trials will just be scrapped?

[JMac]

If a US boxer qualifies for the Olympics from the Pan Am Games which can happen since the Pan Am Games are before the Olympic trials, they will still contest the weight class since the trials are basically to see who will be the alternate.

[Mighty Atom]

That's what confuses me.
Seems to me that the only way the US will need an alternate is if an American qualifies at the Pan-Ams then withdraws (or gets withdrawn by US Boxing) between the Pan-Ams and the final Olympic qualifying tournaments.
Remember that the qualifying is tied to the boxer not the country so a US alternate would need to re-qualify a place for his country.

[margaret thatcher]

the alternate thingy is a bit phony ...........at least in the sense that the media often makes it out to be like the alternate will compete at the olympics if the original guy has to withdraw, but in reality a lot of the time it's more often just the next guy in line to compete at qualifying events

weird situation was the 165 spot for team usa for tokyo........javier martinez wins trials, but joseph hix gets more qualifying points, but then troy isley ends up competing lol