The daughter of subsistence farmers, Nesthy Petecio took up boxing in inter-village competitions so she could get free meals. She battled depression after failing to qualify for the Rio Olympics in 2016, but she punched her way back to the top, bringing home a silver in the featherweight event at the Tokyo games in 2021, and becoming the first Filipina to win an Olympic boxing medal.
Awards
2020
Silver (Women’s Featherweight Division) Tokyo Summer Olympics
2019
Gold (Women’s Featherweight Division) Southeast Asian Games
2019
Gold (Women’s Featherweight Division) Ulan-Ude World Boxing Championships
Did You Know?
Petecio grew up loving basketball instead of boxing, only discovering the sport after her father trained her for self-defense purposes.