Tom Bogs

Biographical information

RolesCompeted in Olympic Games
SexMale
Full nameTom Frank•Bogs
Used nameTom•Bogs
Born21 November 1944 in København (Copenhagen), Hovedstaden (DEN)
Measurements176 cm / 72 kg
AffiliationsCIK, København (DEN)
NOC Denmark

Biography

Tom Bogs’ family sporting background was that of track and field, rather than boxing, as his father Poul Bogs Larsen was Denmark’s national shot put champion from 1947 to 1950 and younger sister Maibritt was national discus champion in 1977. As an amateur, Bogs won three Danish Championships between 1961 and 1964 at weights rising from welterweight to middleweight and was chosen to compete at the Tokyo Olympics. He drew a bye in the first round and defeated a Taiwanese fighter easily in the second round, but his medal dreams were ended when he suffered a cut above the eye in the first minute of the quarter final.

Bogs turned professional within weeks of returning home from Tokyo and over the next four years, fighting exclusively in Denmark and Sweden, he ran up a record of 42 successive wins. In his 43rd fight he defeated Germany’s Lothar Spengel to win his first professional title, the European light-heavyweight title, in one round in Copenhagen. He defended the title once and then gave it up to challenge Italian Carlo Duran for the European Middleweight title, which he also won. His first setback came in the 55rd professional fight in 1970 when he was knocked down and outpointed by the legendary US Virgin Island fighter Emile Griffith. Later the same year he lost his European title when he ventured outside Scandinavia to fight and dropped the belt back to Duran. In 1972 he fought the rugged Argentine fighter Carlos Monzon for the world title in front of his home Copenhagen crowd and, when Monzon suffered a bad cut in the fourth round, Bogs appeared on the verse of a surprise title victory, but the champion launched a vicious assault in the fifth round and Bogs was knocked out for the first time in his career.

A run of victories earned Bogs a shot at future world champion John Conteh’s European Light-heavyweight title but, despite flooring the Englishman, he was stopped in the fifth round. Bogs retired in 1974 after losing to American Tom “The Bomb” Bethea and ended his career with a record 77 wins, 8 defeats, 1 draw and 1 no-contest. During his time as a boxer, he appeared as an actor in the Danish film “Og så er der bal bagefter” and, after retiring from the ring, was a director of an architectural film.

Results

Games Discipline (Sport) / Event NOC / Team Pos Medal As
1964 Summer Olympics Boxing DEN Tom Bogs
Light-Middleweight, Men (Olympic) =5

Special Notes