Olympics: Kiwi boxer bows out

Alexis Pritchard's experience as part of the first women's Olympic boxing competition has whetted her desire to be in Rio in 2016.

The tall Aucklander was well beaten in her quarter-final bout by Russian Sofya Ochigava, the world No 2 and second seed.

Ochigava, more compact and with harder punches, won 22-4, Pritchard being unable to make much of a dent on the Russian southpaw.

She will take a short break but wants to be part of the Commonwealth Games programme in Glasgow in 2014. Rio will then be in sight.

"Two years is not that long and hopefully me being here and Siona (Fernandes, who lost her opening flyweight bout yesterday) will inspire the next generation of New Zealand woman boxers to get into a gym and start fighting because opportunities are out there.

"Hopefully in four years I'll have to bust my arse to get in the New Zealand team," Pritchard said.

Pritchard said, despite the scoreline, she felt more relaxed than in her win over Tunisian Rim Jouini yesterday.

"She just outboxed me. I feel like gave it my all. We knew going in she would be very tough," Pritchard said.

She felt she was able to put about a quarter of her game plan into effect, but was pleased that in mental terms she kept things together.

There are certainly no thoughts of stepping away from the ring for good.

"Boxing is not something you can do just for the fun of it. You either do it to compete, or just do classes. I've really enjoyed boxing over the last four months. I've grown so much as an athlete and boxer."

While Glasgow would again oblige Pritchard to fight out of her preferred 57kg division and step up to the 60kg as she did in London, she's hoping Rio will have her class on the card.

But she stressed that was not the reason she lost today. The third round, when Ochigava put a standing eight count on her and won the round 8-1 effectively decided the contest.