Team Slovakia
1 (1+0)
FREESTYLE WRESTLING
MEN'S
-86kg: Boris Makoev
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1st August 2012.
Milan Randl as our sole judoka in the London 2012 Games lost in the M Judo -90kg class to the famous Greek Ilias Iladis in the 1st round. It was the last time the country competed at any of the combat sports under the five rings...for a long long time...
Fast Forward to 6th May, 2021.
Boris Makoev tied the score against Abubakr Abakarov of Azerbaijan in the dying second sof the bout 4-4 to be designed the winner and advance to the Gold medal match at the Final World Qualifying Tournament in Bulgaria, and by this achievement secured to himself and to the country the Olympic berth. First combat sport quota for Slovakia after 9 years.
In fact for Wrestling, the wait was even longer, 13 years. Last time the flag was above the Olympic mat was in Beijing 2008. Paradoxically, it ended by a medal. David Musulbes (another naturalized Russian) won bronze, which was later upgraded to Silver after the disqualification of original gold medal winner Artur taymazov of Uzbekistan for Doping offense.
28 years old naturalized Russian (North-Ossetian) Freestyle wrestler Boris Makoev, sometimes written by slovak spelling Boris Makojev, will compete in Tokyo as sole Slovak participant in this sport. He will perform in his traditional weight category, the under 86 kilograms.
He received his Slovak citizenship in 2017 and immediately the same year managed to win Silver at the World Championships in Paris losing only to the Rio 2016 (-74kg) champion Yazdani of Iran in the final.
After some troubles with injuries and lost form in the next two years he returned to the mats by winning Bronze at the Europeans in 2020 (Rome) and repeating it this year again in Budapest as well.
Boris will experience his Olympic debut in Tokyo, and who know, depending on the draw, can start a interesting journey for our wrestling which is supposed to peak at the next Olympics in Paris with a couple of other prospects like Salkazanov or Gulaev who will miss Tokyo, but already impatiently and publicly present their ambitions for the games in 3 years.
Slovakia won 1 medal since the independence in this sport (Musulbes in 2008 FS -120kg - Silver) and Lohyňa finished 4th in Atlanta 1996 FS -90kg.
and Slovak wrestlers won also 5 more medals during the Czechoslovak era (1 silver and 4 Bronzes) with Jozef Lohyňa bronze in Seoul 1988 was the last Czechoslovak combat sport medal at the Olympics.