Perhaps you, fellow fight fan, were one of the lucky people to have been present last night at Fighter’s Heaven, the fight camp that once belonged to Muhammad Ali. For last night at the restored gym on Sculps Hill Road, a celebration took place, this just a few days before Ali’s epic, never to be forgotten fight with George Foreman celebrates its 50th anniversary.
The former fight camp that Ali had built in 1972, and served as his training HQ for so many of his big fights, has been lovingly restored by owner and fight fan Mike Madden, and boxing fans, and Ali fans (not necessarily the same thing) can pay a visit and look around inside the wooden cabins Ali and his staff used to call home, with fans also able to see a restored boxing ring that Ali would train in. Also, the huge rocks Ali had painted with the names of fellow boxing greats can be marvelled over.
And last night was a special night, as Fighter’s Heaven opened its doors to some boxing celebrities and well as to the fans. Gerry Cooney was there, as were boxing writers Ron Borges and Don Majeski, while via Skype, Gene Kilroy (Ali’s right-hand man) and Jerry Izenberg (perhaps the last great boxing writer to have covered Ali/Foreman/Frazier/Holmes, and all the others) took part in the events.
Looking back on the incredible fight that took place in the heart of Africa on October 30th 1974, those in attendance reflected on the fight and what it meant to Ali, to the sport of boxing, to Foreman, indeed to the whole world.
“It was Ali’s finest hour,” Madden said of Ali’s upset win over the fearsome Foreman.
Indeed.
With the win, Ali, a 6/1 underdog in some places, had come full circle. Ten years after he had beaten the equally ferocious and “unbeatable” Sonny Liston to become world champ, Ali, stripped in 1967 due to his draft refusal, regained it all with the eighth round KO he scored in Zaire.
“The victory raised Ali to the level of the supernatural,” Borges said last night.
Indeed.
Ali, who had vowed to defeat Foreman, regain the crown and then retire, could have gone out in a state of perfection. But Ali simply couldn’t walk away from what he loved, from something he was, as he proved by chopping down Foreman, still the best in the world at.
Those fans lucky enough to have been there last night watched a screening of the superb ‘When We Were Kings,’ while each person took home a replica fight poster from the 1974 fight.
This Wednesday will mark the 50th anniversary of what will always be known as one of the most important, and most widely viewed, fights in the planet’s history.
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