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George Chuvalo

3K views 16 replies 8 participants last post by  BoxingManiac 
#1 ·
George Chuvalo would be a handful for any fighter. He was never dropped in his life, street fight, sparring, amateur, or pro. He had some power in his hands, and he was strong as an ox.

He gave Ali a tough fight and sent him to the hospital in 1966, yet he went out dancing the very same night. Chuvalo fought huge punchers like Frazier, Foreman, and Bonavena, but his knee's never buckled, even taking several of Foreman's hardest shots smack in the face and on the jaw in a row. Frazier couldn't budge him either. At one point Frazier tried pushing Chuvalo back, and ended up pushing himself back.

At the age of 70 (now) Chuvalo has been reported benching around 500lbs (I think 470 to be exact).

He has had a very tough life with 3 of his sons commiting suicide due to substance abuse, and a wife doing away with herself because of grief. George's struggles outside of the ring were far greater than they ever were in it. He was the Canadian heavyweight champion for 21 years straight, from 1958-1979 when he retired. He was inducted into the Canadian HOF in 1990, and he continues to give lectures and speaches against drugs to this day.

Few men were as tough as George Chuvalo, Tex Cobb resembled a more mediocre Chuvalo, including the iron jaw.
 
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#5 ·
He could live with it because he's one tough sonuffabitch. I mean not just physically. Chuvalo was tough mentally. I wrote this article about him, although I am surprised to learn he is still so fit and strong today. A septegenarian benching 400+ pounds? YIKES!

One thing I learned after writing this article was that in the Frazier fight, Chuvalo's eye socket was crushed. That was what hurt him. Chuvalo said that he thought his eye was just going to fall out of his socket. Yet there he was, refusing to quit. The toughest man Canada has ever produced, bar none.
 
#11 ·
Chuvalo was very tough. Took a lot of punishment in his lifetime. I saw the fight that he had with Floyd Patterson, and boy was Patterson fighting differently that night. The fight between him and Ernie Terell was fixed because of Terell's manager was so intimidating.

Terell's manager tried to intimidate the judges and Ali's manager when they fought. Herbert Muhammad (Ali's bother or manager idk) had his henchmen go and beat Terell's manager within an inch of his life. After that, they sent Terell's manager to a mental institution for the rest of his life. That guy certainly got what he deserved! Doesn't that just say that you cannot mess with Muhammad Ali?
 
#12 ·
Ali got a ton of breaks in boxing, mainly with his decisions later in his career. Sonny Liston took a dive against him though. Right before the 2nd fight he got a phone call that said "You better lose...or else". Sonny knew what the "for else" was, because he used to be the "for else".
 
#14 ·
Future world champions Joe Frazier and George Foreman, despite being big punchers, were unable to knock Chuvalo down, but they were the only fighters to stop him, scoring technical knockout (TKO) victories. Foreman—regarded as one of the hardest hitters in boxing history—mauled Chuvalo, bombing him with punch after punch. Yet, in his typical display of toughness, when the referee stopped the fight in the third round, Chuvalo said to him, "What are you, nuts?"
 
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