Known among boxing fans as the "Hands of Stone" Roberto Duran turns 60 years old today. A world champion from 1972 to 1989 in four different weight divisions...He was the first boxer to defeat the great 'Sugar' Ray Leonard, and was quite unbelievably, a top professional boxer in the 1960's, 1970's, 1980's, 1990's and 2000's. Following serious injuries sustained in a 2001 automobile accident, he retired from the ring with a 103-16 (70 KOs) record.
This is a YouTube video from an online friend of mine who is a boxing fan. There are not many people around who talk about having been to classic boxing matches in the 1940's/1950's and have a perfect recollection of it.
My friend here has quite a few videos of his memories and this is typical of them, wonderful stuff...
Former 2-time heavyweight world boxing champion Mike Tyson (50-6, 44 KOs), who remains at 20 the youngest man to ever win the WBC, WBA and IBF world heavyweight titles, and was for a short while one of the greatest heavyweight champions of all time, will be inducted into the International Boxing Hall of Fame in New York. It's his achievements in the sport which should rightly give Tyson his place on boxing's hall of fame....if Barry McGuigan and Ingemar Johansson are there then so should Mike Tyson. He has his critics who may say, leaving his rape conviction to one side, that some of what he did in and around a boxing ring should mean he shouldn't be celebrated within the sport like this....instances like biting Evander Holyfield's ear, not once but twice, in their 1997 rematch and the sickening outburst while speaking about the Lennox Lewis fight in 2002 where he shouted loudly in front of a ring full of boxing reporters that he would 'eat his (lewis's) children'...and boxing Andrew Golota in 2000 while high on Marijuana.
But, it is what it is, Tyson's skill and achievements can only be admired by followers of boxing and to make the Hall of Fame as legitimate as possible in the eyes of boxing fans then there is really no way you could exclude one of the all-time great heavyweight champions like Mike Tyson.
This video beow shows some of what made Tyson such an amazing champion, the video has been put together by Reznick Productions who I think have some of the best boxing 'edits' videos on YouTube.
Wasn't sure how to title this post.
This is a video myself and my son threw together one day, combining two of our loves in life - Sligo Rovers (his) and the band The Alarm (mine)...it's nothing special but here it is anyway...
This man, in a video from last year, rode full speed down some urban streets in Valparaiso, Chile...dodging stray dogs while wearing a pinstripe suit during an urban downhill mountain bike race
If you do watch the following video....please watch it on full screen for the best experience...and hold tight.. http://vimeo.com/9970489
There's never been a white man on the planet before to run 100 metres in under 10 seconds...never !!...until now...frenchman Christophe Lemaitre has today run a time of 9.98 to win the French National Championships.
But, with the current world record standing at 9.58 and a ton of other sub-10 second times achieved, this lad is still a way off the worlds elite...well done to him though..
Archie Moore was 42 years old and was boxing's current light-heavyweight champion of the world when he challenged the legendary Rocky Marciano for the heavyweight title...there were only 8 weight divisons in those days, and only 1 champion in each division..
The fight took place in 1955...Moore had been a professional boxer for 17 years !! ..and going into the Marciano fight his record was 167 fights, 22 losses, 6 draws, with 111 KO's.
The largest crowd ever to see Marciano fight, 61,574 fans showed up at Yankee Stadium while hundreds of thousands crammed closed-circuit-television theaters across the country to see the fight.
The fight would gross $ 2,248,117 - at the time, the second highest grossing fight in boxing history..
Although Moore was beaten inside of nine rounds by Marciano, who retired after the fight, he was one of only two men to ever put Rocky down...Marciano retired undefeated and went on to become part of boxing folklore..
