By David Field, PA Sport Boxing Correspondent, Sydney

Michael Bennett, convicted armed robber and world amateur champion, found the graduation to the class of the formidable Felix Savon too demanding an examination in Sydney on Tuesday.

The American boxing captain spent a good majority of the five minutes, 57 seconds of his quarter-final on the end of Savon's educated and hurtful right glove and the Cuban is now two victories away from his third Olympic gold medal.

Bennett found himself 7-2 down at the end of the first round, 17-6 in arrears after two and when the judges' keypad buttons recorded 23-8, Savon was declared an automatic winner by virtue of his 15-point lead.

In such cases of major dominance, the scoreboard at the Darling Harbour Exhibition Hall starkly glows "outclassed" - which was probably accurate in Bennett's case.

But the heavyweight from Chicago gave it everything and at one point in the third appeared to momentarily sting Savon.

Afterwards he admitted: "I reached for my star, I just fell short."

The semi-final will pair Savon - Cuba's flag-bearer at the opening ceremony - with Germany's Sebastian Kober, who boxed beautifully to beat Canada's Mark Simmons in the third round of their last-eight bout.

Bennett is candid about his background. His Olympic biography reads: "A friend and I committed armed robbery.

"I was convicted and sentenced to 26 years in prison. The sentence was appealed and later dropped to 15 years.

"In 1995, I was searching for a way to keep fit when three men known as 'Parspason', 'Pharaoh' and 'Mongoose' gave me my first boxing lesson.

"Shortly afterwards I won my first organised fight in a competition put together by the institution.

"On July 28, 1998, I was released from prison and just over a year later I became world champion."

After spending seven years incarcerated, Bennett landed that title in Houston, Texas, a tournament from which the Cubans walked out after because of dreadful judging.

Bennett, 29, said: "I'm not ashamed of my performance because I dug down deep and did my professional best.

"But I was able to live a lot of men's and women's dreams by just competing in the Olympics, just by coming this far and giving 110%.

"I stood in front of him, I let my heart take over when I should have stayed patient, stayed focused and kept my head moving.

"I gave up too many easy shots and he's a one-punch guy, I was a target for him.

"I felt like a did hurt him because I have the power like most heavyweights have the power to end the bout with one punch, but he was able to sustain that punch and keep going being the true warrior that he is.

"I'd have loved it to end up a different way, I can't complain, I can't gripe. Thy will be done.

"It's just nice to have him on my repertoire saying that I faced him and did my best.

"I wasn't in awe of him. He's done a lot of things for amateur boxing because he's amateur boxing history.

"He's a great guy and deserves everything he's got. I've just got to close the book and start another chapter. I didn't think past this far. I had tunnel vision to Sydney."