Editing Alberto Mercado (section)

==Amateur boxing career==
Mercado started boxing as an amateur at the age of 12,  immediately winning a nationwide competition known as the "Olimpiadas Jíbaras de la Vivienda" ("Housing Complex Hillbillies' Olympics"). This motivated him to keep boxing as an amateur and hoping to win a world title in the future.

In 1978, Mercado represented Puerto Rico at the [[1978 Central American and Caribbean Games]] held at [[Colombia]]. He won gold at these games and participated in a world cup tournament. Hoping to become the first Puerto Rican ever to win a gold medal at an Olympic Games, Mercado moved to [[Cuba]] periodically; there he trained hard towards that goal.

Around that era, Mercado befriended and worked alongside one of [[Jose Celso Barbosa]]'s children; he criticized the Puerto Rican government which was led by [[Carlos Romero Barcelo]] of the Statehood supporting [[New Progressive Party of Puerto Rico|New Progressive Party]] and was fired from his job and taken by Puerto Rico Olympic Committee President [[German Rieckehoff Sampayo]] to live in [[Mexico]] for a while.

Mercado was one of only three [[American citizenship|American citizens]] to participate in the [[1980 Summer Olympics|1980 Olympics]] celebrated in [[Moscow]], [[Soviet Union]], bearing the flag<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.sports-reference.com/olympics/countries/PUR/|title=Puerto Rico &#124; Olympics at Sports-Reference.com|date=17 April 2020|accessdate=26 March 2023|archive-date=17 April 2020|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200417092905/https://www.sports-reference.com/olympics/countries/PUR/|url-status=bot: unknown}}</ref> of and competing in boxing for [[Puerto Rico]] after having won the gold medal at the [[Boxing at the 1979 Pan American Games|1979 Pan American Games]]. The other two were also representants from Puerto Rico and boxers: [[Luis Pizarro (boxer)|Luis Pizarro]] and [[José Angel Molina]].

During a 2021 Interview with Cuban-Puerto Rican journalist Jesus "Chu" Garcia on [[YouTube]], Mercado remembered how he and his fellow Puerto Rican boxers Pizarro and Molina were the first delegates of any kind to arrive in Russia and how he flew on [[Aeroflot]] from Cuba to Russia to get there.<ref>{{cite web | url=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NJtRWez7wkI | title=El Chuchazo Podcast - Alberto Mercado | website=[[YouTube]] | date=23 September 2021 }}</ref>