Egor Mekhontsev

Egor Mekhontsev was born on November 14, 1984 in the city of Asbestos, Sverdlovsk region. He has been engaged in boxing since the age of eleven. He played for Dynamo. He trained under the guidance of his father Leonid Mekhontsev. He began his adult amateur career in the category up to 81 kg, then moved to the category up to 91 kg, but later returned to the category up to 81 kg, in which he qualified for the Summer Olympics in London, where he won gold.

The turning point in Mekhontsev's career was 2008. In the first half of 2008, he was withdrawn from the Russian national team under head coach Lebzyak. Mekhontsev tried to turn professional at that moment, but could not sign a contract due to the lack of promoters who satisfied him.

After the Olympics in Beijing, several events happened at once. The Dynamo sports association offered Mekhontsev to move to the weight category up to 91 kg and compete in it at the Russian Championship, since this sports association reserved the category up to 81 kg for Artur Beterbiev. At the same time, Beterbiev did not participate in either the 2008 Russian Championship or the 2008 European Championship, resting after the Beijing Olympics. Mekhontsev easily won all the fights of the Russian championship in a new weight category for himself and became the champion of Russia among adults for the first time.

The second event was that after the Olympics Khromov became the head coach of the Russian national team again. He returned Mekhontsev to the national team and included him in the team for the European Championship. But Khromov didn't have to do much here, since the only potential competitor of Mekhontsev for a place in the team, the winner of the Olympics in this weight, Rahim Chakhkiev, took time to rest and reflect. At the European Championship, held from November 6 to 15, 2008 in Liverpool, Mekhontsev again easily won all the fights: with a clear advantage in the 4th round against Macedonian Nasi Hani, 12:1 against Scot Stephen Simmons, 5:2 against Romanian Petrisor Gananau and 9:2 against Tsolak Ananikyan from Armenia.

At a critical moment for Egor, some experts called Mekhontsev the best amateur boxer in Russia. The subsequent four years confirmed their opinion: Mekhontsev became the only Russian boxer who won the 2012 Olympics, became world champion once, became European champion twice, which no other Russian boxer managed to achieve during this time, and became Russian champion three times, which only Misha Aloyan and Alexander Solyanikov were able to achieve.