Memories of Jimmy Thunder

[goose 5]

Does anyone here have any personal memories/stories to share about Jimmy Thunder ?

[Grant]

I went to see him fight this Big Dutch guy at the show grounds in Melbourne. I was such a dynamic performance and I remember Jack Rennie saying that Jimmy was more impressive at his age than Tyson was. Can anyone else remember that? Other than that the Crawford Grimley KO was one of the great knock outs of all time. As to how good he was it's hard to say, My memory was that he didn't spend much time on Defence. I would like to know where he sat in the mix by someone more qualified than me. He certainly didn't profit from his career

[orbtastic]

Grimsley was sitting behind me at the Hamed/McCullough fight, a few of the crowd recognised him and he had a wry smile for them. Seemed like a decent guy.

[bollocks]

Was living in England and getting news of Oz from magazines as it was pre internet. Kept reading about this monster named Jimmy Thunder built like a bodubuilder KOing people left right and centre. Then one day I picked up a mag to read he'd been KO'd in quick time by one Mike 'The Bounty' Hunter. And that was pretty much the end of that

[Pudge]

I sat next to Jimmy Thunder at the Sam Soliman v Sakio Bika in 2002 in Melbourne. He would have his last fight against Colin Wilson a few weeks later
At Jimmy’s best he was one of the best heavyweights that was based in Australia
Greats wins over Trevor Berbick, Tim Witherspoon and Tony Tubbs who held world titles. I found him a gentleman

[Beltane]

Jimmy was built like an Adonis and he recorded one of the fastest knockouts in heavyweight history when he floored American Crawford Grimsley with the first punch- after just 1.5 seconds into their 1997 fight. Grimsley was then counted out and it was all over in 13 seconds

Jimmy later laughed about that win: “I was hungry. I missed out on my lunch and I missed out on dinner, and I was getting ready for the fight and I walked past the buffet and I said `damn man, I wanna go eat’.”

[fox]

Grimsly went 12 rounds with George Foreman before that fight.

[toppity]

The hype locally about Jimmy was amazing. Main stream TV had him on the news. He had it all, except defense. I wonder what he is up to now?

[margaret thatcher]

The hype locally about Jimmy was amazing. Main stream TV had him on the news. He had it all, except defense. I wonder what he is up to now?

He died last Feb mate

[toppity]

The hype locally about Jimmy was amazing. Main stream TV had him on the news. He had it all, except defense. I wonder what he is up to now?

He died last Feb mate

I didn't hear the news. RIP big Jimmy.

[coneye]

Read somewhere or may have been told , a few years back he was living in vegas i think it was , homeless , and broke , a vagrant , sure i read money was raised to bring him home , Someone else may be able to sill us in if it was all true

[Beltane]

The sad story of Jimmy's hard times can be read below:

https://www.nzherald.co.nz/sport/boxing ... N3USXHZUA/

[AntonioMartin]

The hype locally about Jimmy was amazing. Main stream TV had him on the news. He had it all, except defense. I wonder what he is up to now?

Here in the US too, he was always on USA Thursday Night Fights...

I saw him as a top contender and wondered what was taking him so long in getting a world title shot but had no illusions whatsoever about him beating Evander Holyfield, George Foreman, Riddick Bowe or Lennox Lewis. With Lewis, he had a puncher's chance because-at the time it looked like at least-everyone seemed to have it. With Foreman it would have been a war.

But quite honestly, I never really thought he could beat any of those 4 guys.

His knockout of Crawford Ashley was something to behold, though!

[Fray Bentos]

The BBC showed his heavyweight title win in the Commonwealth Games in Edinburgh in 1986 when he was called Jimmy Peau (I think...) he boxed a Scotsman in the final and he bulldozed his way to the gold medal. I thought he would do something and an English welterweight called Darren Dyer who won gold in that same tournament.