Early in the 1940s when the teenage boy, together with a friend, pushed aside the student desks to the walls of the classroom to do his first sparring match, little did he know what the future had in store for him. He had no proper outfit, boxed barefoot and used some old gloves his friend had brought along to give it a feel of the real thing.

What he had, though, was fervour, diligence and determination not to disappoint his widowed mother, to fight his way up in life. So he whole-heartedly immersed in training, winning, and more training. Less than 10 years would pass before the teenage boy would become the first Bulgarian athlete ever to win an Olympic medal in the 1952 summer games held in Helsinki. A bronze medal in amateur boxing.

Boris Georgiev- the Mocca, as people know him, has told his story of success perhaps a thousand times as he has tried to inspire young Olympian hopefuls throughout the years.

Now think Rocky Balboa, the Sylvester Stallone’s character in the 1976 drama Rocky. Imagine the passion for boxing and fierce determination to win, to prove stamina and endurance, only to withdraw into a quiet, but not lonely, life.

Born in 1929, in Dobrich, Georgiev remembers his childhood as being poverty-stricken and destitute. In those years, Bulgaria was in the pre and post-war economic situation, when food was rationed and women, children and other people not working physically-challenging jobs, received a mere 300 grams of bread a day.

Young Boris worked odd jobs; mostly tending animals, working as a helping hand in the field wherever needed, was a newspaper boy at one point, and made sweets at his uncle’s confectionary shop. He says that his passion for sports is what kept him going. At first he played football as part of a local school club and later tried cycling. One day, a newspaper article featuring destined-to-be coach of the national boxing team Asparuh Angelov, grabbed his attention. Young Boris was genuinely impressed at how Angelov described the qualities a boxer should possess in order to win a fight – a Spartan regime of discipline and training, as well as abstinence from cigarettes and alcohol. Boris found the regime so appealing that he religiously followed it throughout his entire life.
“I cannot say that I was a boxer with a distinct talent, but thanks to my hard work and persistence I became a fighter, who people began to notice and respect,” Georgiev said of those early years.

Only six months into his ‘classroom’ training, the young boxer competed in a regional championship in Varna, where he won the cup without much effort, he says.

 “I am a true amateur,” Georgiev says. “I did not have the means to turn boxing into my profession, but at the same time I really wanted to have something to fall back on, some form of art.”

Georgiev enrolled at the military school in Sofia and became a member of CSKA, the army sports club, where he continued training.
Every morning the boxer would run 10-20 km and at the end of the day he would go to the stadium and complete a 15 round sparring session. 

 “Not many people would sacrifice their youth in the name of an idea,” Lyubka, his wife of 54 years, says. “For Boris, weekends simply did not exist. There were many times when I would have liked to go to the cinema, to do something fun, but no, he had to continue with his training,” she says, without a sign of regret. Lyubka sacrificed her life for his passion, raising their two children, and with humility, remarks that she simply has her cross to bear, and fate has dealt her this hand. She accepts it with “…when you love someone…”

By the time Georgiev was selected for the Bulgarian team going to the Olympic Games in Helsinki, he had won numerous tournaments in Sofia and around the country. He said he had no idea that the best athletes at the Olympics were distinguished with medals. He went with the thought that the Olympics would follow the French historian Pierre de Fredy, Baron de Coubertin’s phrase: It is not important that you win, it is important to participate.

So, Georgiev went to Helsinki to participate. He won against his first three contenders, which automatically qualified him for the bronze medal, unknown to him. Had he beaten his next opponent, a Romanian boxer, in the semi-finals, his next match would have given him a chance to win the gold medal, but he did not know that either. 

“I have never been a vicious, bloody boxer,” Georgiev says. “I was careful not to hurt my partner for no reason, I sort of ballet -danced around the ring.”

After a total of 289 fights, Georgiev was dubbed “the Samaritan” for his desire to practise gentler boxing.

The Olympic award ceremony took him by surprise. He sat with his teammates on the nearby benches, dressed in a suit and a tie. He managed to hear his name being called to the podium, at the same time the Bulgarian flag was being raised up. And a few tears marked the occasion. 

After the Olympics, Georgiev continued to compete until 1957, when an accident in the ring blinded his right eye.

For seven years in a row – 1950-1957 – Georgiev was the state champion in amateur boxing.