BoxRec

I mean it is an unusual sport to follow in many ways, different from team sports and also has that extra edge.

For me it was Barry-McGuigan-Danilo Cabrera and Frank Bruno-Tim Witherspoon.

It seems a lifetime away now; I can't imagine life without boxing.......

The likes of McGuigan, Bruno, Honeyghan were the first UK fighters I followed but I had old tapes of Ali, Foreman, Ray Leonard etc playing on the TV as I was growing up.

Funny thing was that loads of my mates were also mad about boxing and we all followed the US action avidly, even at 8 or 9 years of age. Haglar was the man back then and it was 2 or 3 years before Tyson came on the scene. Some of us even went out and bought oversized gloves and used to have fights in our bedrooms, even had a ref!

Ding_Ding wrote:The likes of McGuigan, Bruno, Honeyghan were the first UK fighters I followed but I had old tapes of Ali, Foreman, Ray Leonard etc playing on the TV as I was growing up.

Funny thing was that loads of my mates were also mad about boxing and we all followed the US action avidly, even at 8 or 9 years of age. Haglar was the man back then and it was 2 or 3 years before Tyson came on the scene. Some of us even went out and bought oversized gloves and used to have fights in our bedrooms, even had a ref!

Same as me mate, except we used to use cushions from the sofa as gloves, and i started following the same boxers, Bruno etc.
I remember watching one of Haglers fights on tv when i was about 10 or 11 and thought i wanted to be just like him, unfortunatly i was white and weighed less than a straw weight, and was about as imtimidating as Les Dennis

topper123 wrote:

Ding_Ding wrote:The likes of McGuigan, Bruno, Honeyghan were the first UK fighters I followed but I had old tapes of Ali, Foreman, Ray Leonard etc playing on the TV as I was growing up.

Funny thing was that loads of my mates were also mad about boxing and we all followed the US action avidly, even at 8 or 9 years of age. Haglar was the man back then and it was 2 or 3 years before Tyson came on the scene. Some of us even went out and bought oversized gloves and used to have fights in our bedrooms, even had a ref!

Same as me mate, except we used to use cushions from the sofa as gloves, and i started following the same boxers, Bruno etc.
I remember watching one of Haglers fights on tv when i was about 10 or 11 and thought i wanted to be just like him, unfortunatly i was white and weighed less than a straw weight, and was about as imtimidating as Les Dennis

Well maybe you could've pretended to be Dave MacAuley.

Talking of MacAuley he was a seriously underrated and exciting fighter. I remember watching him fight on a tiny black and white TV. He knocked out Jake Matlala too - no mean feat.

I'd heard of the Klitscko brothers but dint have a clue who or how good they were. Then one night i was wathing TV and they showed Wlad & Sanders, i remember thinking that Sanders dint really look like a boxer & that Klitscko (who's name i'd heard before) would wipe the floor with him and we all know how that ended up, and from then on i've been hooked.

I have been into boxing now for about 20 years when Tyson stormed onto the scene.

He was devastating in his prime and made even non boxing fans sit up and take notice.

kerrminator wrote:I have been into boxing now for about 20 years when Tyson stormed onto the scene.

He was devastating in his prime and made even non boxing fans sit up and take notice.

yeah, you used to get Tyson fights on ITV on a Sunday morning, about 9.30am, he really revived the sport, as Leonard , Hearns and Hagler had kind of finished at that time.

Couple of fights that stuck in my mind at that time were Duke McKenzie winning the flywieght title against Bohol, I remember when he was interviewed afterwards and he burst into tears saying how strong Bohol was at the start of the fight, I don't know why thats stuck with me. think maybe i was impressed with Duke for showing how you can come through and win even when you doubt yourself at times.

topper123 wrote: Same as me mate, except we used to use cushions from the sofa as gloves, and i started following the same boxers, Bruno etc.
I remember watching one of Haglers fights on tv when i was about 10 or 11 and thought i wanted to be just like him, unfortunatly i was white and weighed less than a straw weight, and was about as imtimidating as Les Dennis

We had a "no head punches rule" which went out of the window on a few occasions. It was hard to explain a slightly blackened eye/fat lip to my old man when I had just been round my best mates house for dinner.

I used to go to my mate Laudis' house on Sunday morning to watch the Tyson fights.

However, it was the 1st Ali v Spinks fight and the Weaver v Tate fights were my first introduction to boxing as far as I recall.

Going round my Uncles with my Dad to watch the middleweight clashes of the 80's and early 90's.

Me and my dad were pro Eubank and Hitman Hearns and my uncle and cousins were Benn, Watson and Hagler fans.

Great nights that sometimes nearly got very messy!

Used to hear about the occasional fight and heard the big names obviously but never really got to see a fight.

Was doing a lot of martial arts and one day got invited by a school friend to go boxing with him and some other guys, did that for 6 months and really enjoyed it, but then stopped for a couple of years.

When I then foudn myself unemployed and living in Morecambe I wandering down to a local gym that had great facilities for me to work out on the speed ball and heavy bag so spent a lot of time there.

Finally moved in with a friend who still had sky and was sports mad and we watched all sports available for a few months, but boxing made the biggest impression, a young Ricky Hatton helped a lot too. Never looked back from there and have bought most of the big fights from the late 80s early 90s that I missed out on.

Watching a skinny boxer I'd never heard of from Detroit, get into the ring with the world welterweight champ Pipino Cuevas. A much feared destroyer who often broke his opponents bones with wrecking ball fists.

I sat down thinking, this wont go long......at it didn't.

Tommy Hearns was like a surgeon, carefuly defusing the time bomb in front of him, then laying him out cold with the 2nd best right hand he ever threw, inside two rounds.

Next day I picked up a Ring magazine and that was it

Marvin Haglers fights, first against Minter, then Sibson and then Hearns began to grab my attention as did Barry Mcuigans rise to the World title.

Also the Rocky films played no small part in cultivating an 11 year old Goz's interest in boxing.

the great atmosphere on the Big Fight Live fights of the early 90s, which i sometimes watched as a kid. can remember very few of them. but it has to be Holyfield-Bowe II that got me into it more. the absolute intensity of holyfield's punching against the bigger man. not having sky in the '90s definitely kept me out of the picture, but as freud said 'that which is repressed will return'

So you're back at the gay clubs then?

Only kidding.

The Bowe v Holyfield trilogy deserves a big place in the historyof the heavyweight division. Bowe's rapid decline has taken the shine off a little, but talk about incident packed. The 1st incredible fight, pure intensity all the way, the 2nd with the Fan man incident, and then the 3rd, with the huge punch from Holyfield from nowhere, followed by the bizzare physical collapse of Evander, and the final punch which dumped him on the canvas for the count.

jamesmcdonnell wrote:So you're back at the gay clubs then?

Only kidding.

The Bowe v Holyfield trilogy deserves a big place in the historyof the heavyweight division. Bowe's rapid decline has taken the shine off a little, but talk about incident packed. The 1st incredible fight, pure intensity all the way, the 2nd with the Fan man incident, and then the 3rd, with the huge punch from Holyfield from nowhere, followed by the bizzare physical collapse of Evander, and the final punch which dumped him on the canvas for the count.

yeah, the third fight was a bit scrappy, and they both had declined. but they declined enough to make a fight that is virtually unmatched for drama. unbelievable left hook from Holyfield & a few rds later he just smeg collapses from a shot that didn't appear so big (though it was a good short punch). sadly, as it was on sky, i never got to see it until three yrs after it happened. always wondered who'd won it as well, lol

Muhammad Ali! 8)

Watching the two Ali vs Spinks fights on TV as a small child with my parents. It made me feel so grown up.

I remember going to school (primary) the next day and thinking I was so grown up telling all the other kids that I had watched 'The Fight' with my dad.

I remember after the first fight going to school and saying "Ali's not The Greatest anymore, Leon Spinks is). Even though I knew nothing about Boxing at that point I knew Ali was 'The Greatest' or 'The Champ' the guy was so huge in the late 70's it was unreal.

Yes, I watched the first fight with my Mum, Aunt and Uncle, and my Aunt and Mum cried out loud when he lost, lamenting how old and tired he looked.

Hagler/Hearns was the first fight I watched.

Listening to Marciano v Cockell on the radio with granddad.

Oh shit, really showing my age here, being taken to watch Sugar Ray Robinson spar in Windsor in 1951 but i was only a kid, then the radio and black and white TV. Then going to Highbury in 1966 as a 19 yr old to watch Ali show poor old Henry what he meant to do in !963.

as an 8 or 9 year old,the benn - watson - eubank saga... and frank bruno

The Larry Holmes-Ken Norton fight!!!

Andy Mac wrote:Oh shit, really showing my age here, being taken to watch Sugar Ray Robinson spar in Windsor in 1951 but i was only a kid, then the radio and black and white TV. Then going to Highbury in 1966 as a 19 yr old to watch Ali show poor old Henry what he meant to do in !963.

You saw Sugar Ray Robinson in the flesh!!!!!!!

I'm impressed.