In 1994 Ken Buchanan went to New York to look for Roberto Duran

"I had watched him continue his career as mine slipped away. Whatever he achieved I still felt he didn't deserve to be world champion, rolling in dough and glory. I keep seeing the big picture in my head of June 1972 and Duran is jumping about the ring with my title. I go white-hot with anger...nothing can cool me down.

All I ever wanted was a return fight but Duran stayed well ouut of my road. Every time I was in position to ask for a title fight there was some excuse...so here I am working as a joiner more than 20 years later and I can't take it. Any time I have tried to talk to another person about this, they just tell me, "Ken, it's just one of those things".

But it's not just one of those things. For the rest of the world it might be just one of those things, but for me it is the thing. And by now I am old enough and ugly enough to know that it has to be dealt with. If I had a pound for every time somebody asked me if I would have beat Duran [in a rematch] i'd be a millionare. And every time I got asked that question my heart broke just a little bit further.

I flew from Edinburgh to London...I got a flight to Kennedy Airport...to be honest it felt like it was just the day before I was fighting Duran. When we landed in America my heart was pounding. I was looking out the taxi thinking, what was I doing? One man in a city of ten million trying to find another single human being amongst the those ten million.

We arrived in Harlem where the bed and breakfast was. I got out of the cab and caught a few people loooking at me. But that didn't bother me. Nothing much frightens me at all now...the door opens and this woman pokes her head otu. She's about five feet nothing in her socks.

"Yes?"

"I phoned from the terminal. You said you had me a room for a couple of weeks."

"But man - you is white!"

"Jesus - you're the second person today to tell me that!"

"You're white!"

"Yes brilliant, Christ, I know that."

I smile, she smiles, and she lets me in. She takes me to Mrs. Wells restraunt up the street. Up the stairs we go and people are looking. She opens the door and we go in. The place falls silent. Not a fork or a knife scraping a plate. Mouths are hanging open. There is a white man in the doorway...but I didn't give a **** - to be honest there are times in your life when nothing matters, and I think people pick up on that.

After about ten days looking for Duran in all the gyms and bars, I decided I was never going to find him...So after two weeks in Harlem I went back to Scotland..."

Ken Buchanan, from his autobiography.

 

I reckon that's exactly what he was doing!