Tatjana Genrich made a pact with a boxing promoter years ago that she would return to the ring one day. On Saturday she makes good on it.
The 33-year-old, crowned Miss Deutschland in 2022, opens her professional career on the undercard of SES Boxing’s “Das große Finale” at Messe Magdeburg, a four-round atomweight bout on a card headlined by the third meeting between WBO Inter-Continental champion Roman Fress and WBO European champion Armend Xhoxhaj, according to SES Boxing.
It is her first competitive bout in 16 years. Between 2007 and 2009 Genrich was a three-time Saxony-Anhalt state champion at flyweight as a teenager, trained at a sports boarding school attached to an Olympic boxing base, and turned down a professional start at 17 to pursue modelling.
“My dream of a pro career is coming true”
Her return began with an informal agreement with SES Boxing promoter Ulf Steinforth. Genrich, who sponsors the ring-card models at SES events, says the deal has been in the background for years.
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“Yes, we had an agreement and I’m making good on it now. During those years I always lived very close to boxing, and now my dream of a professional career is coming true,” she told reporters at Wednesday’s press conference in Magdeburg.
She has been training five days a week under Dirk Dzemski, the coach who guided Robert Stieglitz to a world title, and stands 1.70 metres, tall for an atomweight. Steinforth called the height “a real advantage in this weight class” and pointed to SES’s record in the division, which has produced world champions Tina Rupprecht and Fabiana Bytyqi.
Steinforth puts her on the Halmich line
The promoter has gone further in public interviews, drawing a line from Genrich to Regina Halmich, the Karlsruhe flyweight who held the WIBF title for more than a decade and turned women’s boxing into prime-time viewing in Germany.
Steinforth has said Genrich has the presence and ambition to follow Halmich’s path to a world title, according to World Boxing News.
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Genrich’s own framing is less about profile than purpose. She has said she first took up boxing at school as a defence against bullying, and that her aim at the top end of the sport is a world title, not a promotional shine.
“I want to be a role model for young women and show them that you can be successful in both your career and sports,” she told World Boxing News.
Saturday night at Messe Magdeburg
Doors at Messe Magdeburg open at 5pm local time, with the first fights starting at 6pm local time, according to the event listing. Genrich’s opponent was still open at Wednesday’s press conference, with SES saying further bouts, including a second professional debut and a fight for Magdeburg’s Moaed Azizeh, would be announced separately. The boxing portion airs live on MDR’s “SPORT im Osten – Boxen live” from 10:45pm local time, with a stream in the ARD media library and on sportschau.de.
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