Mohamed Ali died at the age of 74 on Friday in Phoenix, Arizona. Olympic champion, world champion three times, he will have ruled the golden age of trucks and forged his legend by his struggles and commitments outside the ring .
The great Muhammad Ali boxing champion died Friday night in Phoenix, at the age of 74, according to NBC, citing a spokesman for the family. Hospitalized since Thursday for respiratory problems, former triple world champion boxing and Olympic champion in 1960 succumbed to respiratory problems. His family had previously announced that the treatment of his condition was made more difficult by Parkinson's disease from which he suffered for three decades.
At the crossroads of myth and Hollywood script, the life of Cassius Clay - the original name of Mohamed Ali - switches to a banal theft. And who knows, it would undoubtedly have been dramatically different if, this afternoon autumn 1954, party scarfing popcorn, the dazed had not left his brand new bike for the first thank you passing thief. Annoyed, the young Clay wants to battle and went into a boxing gym. Twelve, forty kilos soaking wet, but already full of aplomb. "This guy's done, I'll finish the first round," he predicted in the local newspaper before his first fight.
The son of a humble family, Clay grew up in Louisville, Kentucky industrial city torn by racial segregation. More comfortable in the ring than on the school benches, he won in 1959 the prestigious Golden Gloves tournament. In Rome the following year, he surpasses his fear of flying to clinch Olympic gold, at light heavyweight. After a hundred amateur games, the phenomenon turned professional at 18 years under the tutelage of Angelo Dundee, the man still corner.
Spectacular, with his footwork and evasions of a new time, Clay quickly up the hierarchy heavyweight. Just four fights under his belt, he ridicules Ingemar Johansson, former king of the category, during a sparring session. Naughty, he declaims, sometimes in verse, odes to his talent to the press that delights. In 1962, he sends Archie Moore carpet, former world champion heavyweight. A year later, Henry Cooper at Wembley triumph and offers world a chance against Sonny Liston.
Cassius Clay to Muhammad Ali
"Everyone thought that Sonny would shut his big mouth and would return to Louisville in a shroud," says Nigel Collins, American journalist, quoted by Frédéric Roux in Alias Ali. Too young, too tender, bookmakers give Clay lost 7 against 1; The team even speaks of "the most commercial world championship" ever created.
February 25, 1964, Clay coronation is escorted by controversy: Liston, citing a shoulder injury, gives up on his stool. "I'm the greatest ... I shocked the world!" Then exclaimed the winner, hysterical with the press. FBI declassified archives in 2014 tends to confirm the suspicions of fraud. The same doubts born of revenge, won by Clay a year later on a harmless right, the infamous "phantom punch."
With his title, Clay announced his conversion to Islam and took the name Muhammad Ali. It appears alongside Malcolm X and Elijah Muhammad, leader of the Nation of Islam, an African-American sectarian group that preaches hatred of whites and the separation of the races. Consequently, more than it amuses Ali divides and crystallized the fears of white America. His statement on Vietnam, while the United States are at war - "I have nothing against the Vietcong, no Vietnamese I've never negro Treaty" - earned him the opprobrium of the patriots. The gap widens with the public, his victories are no longer recipe. The refusal of its incorporation in 1967, results in the loss of his title. The beginning of an exile of three and a half years
away from the ring.
Exile and reconquest
Despite being sentenced to five years in prison, Ali remains a free man; hero of the pacifist youth, the fallen champion string of academic conferences, doing a play on Broadway, or sells his talents as sparring partner. Bleached by the Supreme Court in 1970, he lost fourteen kilos, returns to the ring and outperforms Jerry Quarry. In his absence, Joe Frazier won in heavyweight boss. Their first duel, sold by promoter Don King as the "Fight of the Century" (1971), ended with the first defeat of Ali and the birth of a rivalry immutable.
For Ali, regaining his title pass by Zaire under the financial benevolence of dictator Mobutu. In the humidity of Kinshasa, 30 October 1974, he knocked George Foreman in the eighth round of the famous "Rumble in the Jungle." The height of his fame, but also the threshold of its decline. A year later, Manila will last spark of talent. In one of the most violent battles of history, Ali sealed a victory the epilogue to his trilogy with Joe
Frazier (Ali won the rematch in 1974). "I really felt that I was approaching death," he told L'Equipe in 2001
decline
Pride or unconsciousness, then connects Ali fights too. Last-ditch stand, he resumed his title to Leon Spinks, who had dethroned in 1978. When he capitulates to Larry Holmes, two years later, Ali is a shadow of the champion he summer. He bows out on a final defeat the following year, in general indifference. By 1984, the first symptoms of Parkinson's disease appear.
Away from the lights of the ring, Ali remains at the front of the stage. Rehabilitated since taking distance with the Nation of Islam, he was received at the White House by Gerald Ford and honored by George W. Bush. In 1990, the first of the Gulf War, he went to Baghdad and Saddam Hussein gets the release of 15 American hostages. Under the weight of the disease, his physical decline is accentuated; his public appearances are increasingly rare. The image of Ali, old before his time, shaking to light the Olympic flame in Atlanta in 1996, upset the world.
More than an athlete, a cultural icon, a social and political force. Bright, naive, charming, sassy, Ali leaves so many faces of himself and jokes it is almost impossible to break the man. Became the face of Parkinson's patients, he had ceased to engage in research against the disease. Worthy facing decline, while the progress of the syndrome gradually deprived of speech. Sad irony of the biggest braggart in sports history silenced. Remains a maxim, repeated at will. The epitaph of a life of struggle, amorous conquests and dubious investments. "Humble people are never far away."
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