Sport Club RRI – In memoriam Mihai Leu
Romania's first world champion in professional boxing has passed on
Florin Orban, 09.07.2025, 13:45
The Romanian sports world is in mourning; Mihai Leu, the first Romanian world champion in professional boxing, left us last week. After he had given up boxing, he became a national champion in car racing. He passed away at the age of 57 after a long suffering and was buried in his native city of Hunedoara, in central Romania.
Mihai Leu was born on February 13th, 1968, and took up boxing at the local Sports Club. In 1982 he came to Bucharest and started training under the guidance of the famous coach Ion Monea. In 1986 he joined Steaua Bucharest and became part of Romania’s national boxing team. In 1987 he reaped the world junior title and in the same year, after a tournament in Greece, he refused to return to Romania and settled in Germany.
Mihai Leu turned professional in 1991 and reaped the intercontinental WBO title in 1995. He won the WBO welterweight title in Hamburg in 1997 when he defeated Panamanian Santiago Samaniego. He became the first professional world champion in Romania’s history. He got injured in the match against Samaniego and had to be operated on in his left arm. After a long recovery break he came back to the ring in September 1997 and defended his title against the Irish challenger, Michael Carruth, in Aachen. He withdrew from professional boxing competitions a year later without knowing defeat.
He had made his debut in car racing as early as 1994 in the Banat rally, where he came fifth on board of a Volkswagen. He won the national title on board of a Hyundai Accent in 2003. He participated in competitions until 2008, when he decided to get involved in the management of rally teams and in developing the country’s National Rally Championship. In 2003 he graduated from the National Institute of Physical Education and Sport in Timisoara, western Romania.
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