Meet Cape Verde’s Nancy Moreira, IOC Olympic Solidarity Scholar and African boxing champion

Photo: Nancy Moreira. Retrieved from olympics.com

Cape Verde boxing star Ivanusa Gomes Moreira, also known as ‘Nancy Moreira’, doesn’t make excuses.

The West African only picked up a pair of gloves for the first time at the age of 23, but worked harder than anyone else in her gym to make up for lost time. Today, she boasts a world class boxing resume.

Last year, aged 32, she finished fifth in the welterweight division at the 2022 IBA Women’s World Boxing Championships, despite receiving almost no financial support from her national federation and relying on her funding from the International Olympic Committee’s Olympic Solidarity programme.

But the best was yet to come.

In August 2023, Moreira won gold at the African Boxing Championships, taking a significant step towards her dream of competing at the Olympic Games Paris 2024. In order to get there, she will have to be at her best at the Africa Boxing Qualifier in Dakar, Senegal.

“I wanted to be someone and I wanted to be appreciated for my sport. So I trained, I trained harder than everyone else because I was the first to arrive, I was the last to leave,” Moreira told Olympics.com.

“I wasn’t imitating anyone because I knew that sometimes in order to achieve something, you have to do more than others.”