Boxing Information

Men's Weight classifications according to WBC, WBA, IBF, and WBO:
| Category | Weight |
|---|---|
| Straw weight | up to 105 lb (47.6 kg) |
| Junior Flyweight | 105 to 108 lb (49.0 kg) |
| Flyweight | 108 to 112 lb (50.8 kg) |
| Super Flyweight/Junior Bantam Weight | 112 to 115 lb (52.2 kg) |
| Bantamweight | 115 to 118 lb (53.5 kg) |
| Super Bantamweight/Junior Featherweight | 118 to 122 lb (55.3 kg) |
| Featherweight | 122 to 126 lb (57.2 kg) |
| Super Featherweight/Junior Lightweight | 126 to 130 lb (59.0 kg) |
| Lightweight | 130 to 135 lb (61.2 kg) |
| Super Lightweight/Junior Welterweight | 135 to 140 lb (63.5 kg) |
| Welterweight | 140 to 147 lb (66.7 kg) |
| Super Welterweight/Junior Middleweight | 147 to 154 lb (69.9 kg) |
| Middleweight | 154 to 160 lb (72.6 kg) |
| Super Middleweight | 160 to 168 lb (76.2 kg) |
| Light Heavyweight | 168 to 175 lb (79.4 kg) |
| Cruiserweight/Junior Heavyweight | 175 to 200 lb (90.7 kg) |
| Heavyweight | over 200 lb (over 90.7 kg) |
Weight classes for boxing at the Summer Olympics Beijing China 2008 :
| Category | Weight |
|---|---|
| Light Flyweight | 48 kg |
| Flyweight | 51 kg |
| Bantamweight | 54 kg |
| Featherweight | 57 kg |
| Lightweight | 60 kg |
| Light Welterweight | 64 kg |
| Welterweight | 69 kg |
| Middleweight | 75 kg |
| Light Heavyweight | 81 kg |
| Heavyweight | 91 kg |
| Super Heavyweight | 91 kg & over |
About Boxing, Boxing Legends, Hall of Fame
About Boxing
Boxing, nicknamed the "sweet science" and also called pugilism
or prizefighting, is a sport where two participants of similar
weight attack each other with their fists in a series of two
to three-minute intervals called "rounds". In both Amateur and
Professional divisions, the combatants (called boxers or
fighters) avoid their opponent's punches whilst trying to land
punches of their own. Points are awarded for clean, solid
blows to the legal area on the front of the opponent's body
above the waistline, with hits to the head and torso
especially valuable. The fighter with the most points after
the scheduled number of rounds is declared the winner. Victory
may also be achieved if the opponent is knocked down and
unable get up before the referee counts to ten (a Knockout, or
KO) or if the opponent is deemed too injured to continue (a
Technical Knockout, or TKO).
Boxing legends
The boxing world has produced talented and world famous
personalities in both the amateur and professional realms.
Famous amateur boxers have usually been Olympic medallists.
The Olympics have long been considered a springboard for
professional entry, though some Olympic champions prefer to
retain their amateur status, including two Cuban three-time
gold medalists, Teófilo Stevenson and Félix Savón.
It is the professional side of boxing, however, that has
produced the celebrities whose activities the public have
generally followed. In the period between bare-knuckle
pugilism and post-Queensberry boxing, Jem Mace was important.
He carried many of the traditions of the old London
Prize-Ring, but promoted the use of gloves and helped to
popularize the sport in the United States and Australia. In
the post-Queensberry era, the first British fighter to achieve
superstar status was Bob Fitzsimmons. He weighed less than 12
stone but won world titles at Middleweight (1892), Light
Heavyweight (1903), and Heavyweight (1897). He fought his last
bout at the age of fifty-two.
Great Britain, the birth place of modern boxing, has produced
numerous boxing legends. Among British amateur boxers, only
those who won Olympic gold medals tended to achieve
recognition beyond the limits of boxing enthusiasts. They
included Harry Mallin (Middleweight), 1920 and 1924), Terry
Spinks (Flyweight, 1956), Dick McTaggart (Lightweight, 1956)
and Chris Finnegan (Middleweight, 1968).
London rules and pre-Queensberry era
The bareknuckle era produced legends like John L. Sullivan,
the first world heavyweight champion. Sullivan has been called
the first great American sports hero.
1900s to 1920s
It is the post-Queensberry (or Modern) era that has the
greatest number of legendary boxers, such as world heavyweight
champions Jim Jeffries (the first Great White Hope) and Jack
Johnson (the first black world heavyweight champion), who
fought each other in 1910 in the first "Fight of the Century".
Successful fighters have provoked fierce local pride. The best
example was Jimmy Wilde, a Welsh flyweight who won the world
Flyweight Championship in 1916 and held it until 1923. He once
had a sequence of eighty-eight fights without defeat. Between
1911 and 1923, he won seventy-five of his fights by a
knockout. He was idolized in Wales, where they commonly
believed him to be the best boxer, pound-for-pound, that ever
lived. He was described as the "Mighty Atom" and "the ghost
with a hammer in his hand".
1920s to 1940s
Jack Dempsey was one of the most important athletes of roaring
twenties and became the World heavyweight champion after
defeating Jess Willard. Joe Louis dominated the heavyweight
scene for 12 years before retiring as world champion in 1949.
Shortly before the beginning of WW2, the battles between Louis
and Max Schmeling were seen as battles between America and
Nazi Germany. Louis is considered by many one of the best
boxers of the Depression and possibly of all time. Another
famous boxer, James Braddock (better known as the Cinderella
Man) inspired many with his rags to riches story. He
eventually fought his way to the heavyweight title and won
against Max Baer who had 10 to 1 odds in his favor. Braddock
finally lost his title to Joe Louis but made financial
arrangements with him to receive 10% of the profits from the
rest of Louis's fights.
Britain has had other popular world champions. In the 1930s,
Jackie Berg won the light welterweight title. In the 1940s,
Freddie Mills won the light heavyweight title. In the 1950s
and 1960s, Randy Turpin and Terry Downes won middleweight
titles. and in the 1970s, John Conteh and John Stracey won the
light heavyweight and welterweight titles respectively. With
so many title-awarding bodies in the 1980s and 1990s, the
public became unsure about who actually was the champion.
Nevertheless, the successes of Nigel Benn, Naseem Hamed, Chris
Eubank, Joe Calzaghe, and Ricky Hatton continued to bring
extensive media coverage to boxing and sustained a
considerable public following.
The Scots had a similar pride in Benny Lynch, a flyweight from
Glasgow, who held the world flyweight title in 1935 and again
in 1937. Over the years, Scots have had great success at this
weight; Jackie Paterson won the title in 1943 and Walter
McGowan in 1966. Scots have also had success in the
lightweight division. Ken Buchanan won the title in 1971 and
Jim Watt in 1980.
England, too, had its successes at the lighter weights. Among
the flyweights, Jackie Brown won the title in 1932, Peter Kane
in 1938 and Terry Allen.
1940s to 1960s
The 1950s had a boxer who would go down in history as the only
undefeated world heavyweight champion: Rocky Marciano. The
title of the movie Rocky was inspired by this legend. This era
also had Sugar Ray Robinson, who most experts rate as the best
pound-for-pound boxer of all time. Robinson held the world
welterweight title from 1946 to 1951, and the world
middleweight title a record five times from 1951 to 1960.
Another great of this period was Archie Moore, who held the
world light heavyweight title for ten years and scored more
knockout victories than any other boxer in history.
In Northern Ireland, Rinty Monahan held the flyweight title
from 1947 to 1950, and Barry McGuigan won the W.B.A.
featherweight title in 1985.
1960s to 1980s
The decades of the 1960s & 1970s are best remembered by the
dominance of a boxer once named Cassius Clay, who said he
would "shock the world." He joined the Nation of Islam,
changed his name to Muhammad Ali, and declared himself against
war. Many sociologists, observers, and critics now view Ali as
a reflection of the changing society of that time. Ali had
tough opponents like Sonny Liston, Joe Frazier, Ken Norton,
and George Foreman, but proved himself to be the best
heavyweight of his era, if not of all time. Larry Holmes (a
former sparring partner of Ali) and the electric promoter Don
King both gained prominence during this time.
After the retirement of Ali, Sugar Ray Leonard became the
biggest star in the sport. In the late 1970s and the 1980s,
Leonard won world titles in five different weight divisions,
and was the first boxer to make 100 million dollars during his
career.
1980s to present
If there was ever a bad boy of boxing, the title surely would
go to a man who burst into professional boxing like a
hurricane; Mike Tyson. Nicknamed "Iron Mike" because of his
devastating punching power, Tyson took the world by storm. The
most dominant figure on the heavyweight division in the
mid-to-late 80s, he ran through his opponents like a wrecking
ball, becoming the first undisputed champion in a decade. Both
in and out of the ring, he was always in the news. He was
jailed multiple times, barred from boxing for a year after
biting a chunk out of Evander Holyfield's ear, and going into
bankruptcy. When he fought his last title fight, against
Lennox Lewis in 2002, he was beaten thoroughly and knocked
out. Lewis, a Canadian trained British born heavyweight
titleholder, retired as champion.
Roy Jones, Jr. was the most dominant fighter of the 1990s and
early 2000s. He won world titles in four different weight
divisions, from middleweight to heavyweight. When he defeated
John Ruiz to win the WBA heavyweight title, he was the first
former middleweight champion to win a heavyweight title since
Bob Fitzsimmons accomplished the feat over one hundred years
earlier.
Oscar De La Hoya was possibly the most popular American boxer
of his era. He won titles from junior lightweight to
middleweight. With good looks and charisma, along with plenty
of boxing talent, he became the richest non-heavyweight in the
history of boxing.
Julio Cesar Chavez was the most dominant fighter of this era.
He defeated many big name fighters like: Roger Mayweather,
Melderick Taylor, and Hector Camacho. However, his illustrious
streak was broken by Frankie Randall. After, the Randall fight
the once invincible Chavez was see as vulnerable.
Subsequently, he lost to De La Hoya and Costya Tzyu.
Britain had to wait 100 years to have its first heavyweight
champion since Bob Fitzsimmons lost his title in 1899. Lennox
Lewis became undisputed champion in 1999, having first gained
the W.B.C. title in 1993. Frank Bruno held the W.B.C. world
heavyweight title from 1995 and 1996, after beating the man
who beat Lewis, Oliver McCall. He lost it to Mike Tyson in a
rematch of their 1989 title bout.
Sue Atkins (alias Sue Catkins) helped to pioneer women's
boxing in Britain in the 1980s, but without any official
recognition. The first British woman to be issued with a
license was Jane Couch from Fleetwood, who won the Women's
International Boxing Federation (W.I.B.F.) welterweight title
in 1996.
International Boxing Hall of Fame
For many years, the sport of boxing did not have a hall of
fame. The inspiration for the boxing hall of fame evolved from
a tribute the town of Canastota, New York held for two local
heroes in 1982. The tribute was for Carmen Basilio, who was
world welterweight and middleweight champion in the 1950s, and
his nephew, Billy Backus, who was world welterweight champion
in the early 1970s. The people of Canastota raised money for
the tribute, which was so success that some started to look
into the idea of creating the sport's first hall of fame and
museum. The International Boxing Hall of Fame opened in
Canastota in 1989. In 1990, the first group of legends were
inducted, which included Jack Johnson, Benny Leonard, Jack
Dempsey, Henry Armstrong, Sugar Ray Robinson, Archie Moore,
and Muhammad Ali. The Hall of Fame holds it's induction
ceremony every June as part of a four day event.




