What got you into boxing?

Who was that then?

 

Cassius Clay/ Muhamed Ali, the world had never seen anything like him, a boxer with a brain.

 

Alan Richardson. I was a bit of a cocky sod and prone to throw lead left hooks (southpaw). He came in looking for the left hand and I caught him high up with the best short right hand that I have ever thrown...he was way off balance but it was a legit knock down

 

me and my mate used to watch all the fights in the early eighties with his dad,still did until his dad died this year
we both started boxing,he went pro in early 90's,pretty good litghtwelter (blue butterworth),me i liked beer to much,we still go gym to knocked the **** out off each other now and again,well he knocks the **** out of me

 

My old man got me a ticket for this and promised to take me then gave my ticket to his army buddy and went with him! i was gutted and still hav`nt forgiven him!

Im from a boxing family,dad and uncles all boxed pro in the 50`s and 60`s,dad fought Howard Winstone,now im a pro trainer.:thumbsup

 

I used to be allowed stay up late at the weekends with my old man to watch the boxing on ITV, I remember we used to love when Eubank was on because no matter who he was against we were against him.

My Dad went over to England after the Hurricane in 1990 (I was 6 then) to help with the clean up over there as he works for the Irish Electricity Board (ESB) he was part of relief workers sent over to help restore power to effected areas and he brought me home a pair of boxing gloves. I have to say they were the greatest present of all time, :bbb

That pretty much had me hooked ever since,

 

Mixture of sunday grandstand and then my mum getting me into gambling and pro boxing on the same night for a Hamed fight placing a bet with me for 1 English pound. She new full well Hamed was going to win. *****.

 

my grandad was an ww2 army boxing champ...in his own words, he couldnt box worth a f**k but he could bang and he could fight!!.....maybe this explains my love of fighters like benn etc..over the more polished article!!!..started watching boxing on grandstand and the like, hagler hearns, leanord duran etc.....forst fight i remember seeing was ali loseing and then winniogn vs spinks and being brutally dismantled by holmes.....

 

Being showed highlights of old Nigel Benn fights.
Warrior!

 

Watching Bruno Vs Witherspoon and it never stopped from that point onwards

 

Sportsnight on the BBC usually had fights on and I was lucky enough (early 80s) to have a cast-off telly in my room and watched with the sound off. I remember Minter-Hagler for example early on and Harry Carpenter's disgust!

But also big fights on ITV, especially in the early 80s. That got me hooked and when the middleweight era came along I was set for life. It's odd as none of my pals were boxing fans at all, it's been my wee hidden thing for 40-odd years!

 

Three generations of family connected to the sport, and as a kid, being the only one who could use the video recorder meant I was instructed to record all the boxing on TV. Also grew up reading Boxing News, technically had a subscription from the moment I could read. Honestly, no option but to have an interest in the sport, given how certain family relationships would have played out had I not.

Never appreciated it at the time, but I was often taken to LEBA by my grandfather to keep him company – pre-internet era, so I kind of met everyone around the sport in and around London, past and present from that period. But no internet meant it was difficult to put faces to names and records.

Ironically, Ronnie O'Sullivan's grandfather, Mickey, was involved with running LEBA back then, might've been the secretary, if memory serves.

 

Boom Boom Mancini and Livingstone Bramble.

 

ITVs Saturday night Big Fight Live broadcasts. The music from Layer Cake, young Khan, Calzaghe, Graham Earl Vs Katsidis, the Harrison Williams Skelton Sprott merry go round, they were good days.

 

My granda as well one of my childhood memories was going to the gym when I was we and learning to stand orthodox .Then about 2006 I bought a bag then loved boxing .I ended up with my then late granda and great uncles scrap books and found a vid of my great uncle in the corner of a British title fight .My granda boxed in Dublin at the stadium on the sane card as Gerry Ocolmain in the amatuers .My great uncle Tony boxed Jim Spike McCormack , Johnny Kidd , Dereck Clarke , Sammy Cowan and Mike Coen in the pros .