Welterweight Sedia Sanogo grew up just a 20-minute drive from the arena hosting the Paris 2024 boxing tournament, but she has chosen to chase her Olympic dream under the flag of Ivory Coast, the country of her parents.
"When I watched the Rio Olympic Games in 2016, there were many people from many countries, including my teammates from the French team, but Ivory Coast was not represented," Sanogo, 33, told Reuters. "I asked myself: Where are they?"
Having won several French titles as a teenager before taking an over 10-year break from boxing, Sanogo, a trained social worker from Paris' densely populated multi-ethnic Seine-Saint-Denis suburb, decided in 2020 to revive her career. "In Ivory Coast, many have a traditional way of thinking. We say boxing is a men's sport, it's not for women," Sanogo said.
"There's this aspect of wanting to show the way as we lead the pack - we want to motivate others to follow our example, and to be an example, we have to work hard, we have to fight, we have to win," she said.
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