Audley Harrison: amateur and professional career

2024 Author: Henry Conors | [email protected]. Last modified: 2024-02-12 02:54

Audley Harrison was born in England on 1971-26-10 in London, has Jamaican roots. 1998 Commonwe alth Games winner in Malaysia. In 2000, he won the gold of the Olympic Games in Australia (Sydney) in the most prestigious weight category + 91. He has the title of European champion in 2010 according to the EBU. Audley Harrison is the world champion among professionals in the not very prestigious boxing version of the WBF.

The boxer's amateur career was fast-paced, and many experts from the boxing world believed that he would achieve the highest results in the professionals and could replace the legendary British boxer Lennox Lewis. But Audley Harrison, whose photo is presented in the article, did not justify the hopes placed on him.

Amateur career

Audley Harrison (by the standards of amateur boxing) started playing this sport late - at the age of 19. Participated in international tournaments of various levels, European and world championships, but did not have serious victories until the triumph at the 1998 Commonwe alth Gamesof the year. For the victory he was awarded the Order of the British Empire.

He lost to Turkish Sinan Samil Sam, Belarusian Sergei Lyakhovich, and Russian Alexei Lezin, whom he was able to defeat ahead of schedule in the first fight at the 2000 Olympics. The Russian looked good in this fight and was in the lead, but in the fourth round Harrison Audley was able to deliver the strongest left hook and shake Alexei Lezin. After the referee counted the Russian, he decided to stop the fight. The remaining three fights against the Ukrainian, Italian and Kazakh Harrison held confidently and won unconditional victories.

Audley Harrison is a boxer who won the first Olympic gold medal among the British masters of the leather glove in the heavyweight category.

Professional career

After his success at the Olympics, Harrison decided to turn to professional boxing. Wrote an autobiographical book in 2001. He signed a contract with the BBC channel to show 10 of his fights for a serious amount (1 million pounds) and made his debut in the professional ring in the same 2001.

The beginning of his career was successful, Harrison began with a victory over American national Julius Long. Already by the fifth fight, he defeated his undefeated compatriot Mark Krens. Then he successfully won victories, mostly by knockouts.

Audley's biggest mistake

According to Audley, his first mistake in his career as a professional boxer was the combination of performances in the ring and also work in his personalpromotion company. He founded it in 2001 and named it A-Force Promotions.

Audley Harrison could not fully concentrate on his performances, and this played a cruel joke on him. And also he was too frivolous about training. The boxer believed that luck would not leave him, even if he did not make any special efforts. Until a certain time, everything went well, but he won victories until the level of his opponents was too good. He was helped by his excellent natural data.

Five years of his performances in the professional ring Audley Harrison, whose career developed successfully, was invincible. He moved from his native England to the US in 2005 and married his girlfriend Rachel. The wedding was played in their historical homeland - in Jamaica. Today, the couple are happily married and have a daughter, Ariella, and a son, Hudson.

After that, Harrison completely relaxed and, with the disagreement of the judges, suffered the first defeat of his professional career from compatriot Dani Williams. Audley's next fight was lost to American Dominic Guin. After these failures, many experts and ordinary boxing fans wrote him off.

Fight for world title

Audley Harrison didn't draw the right conclusions. He did not listen to the advice of others and continued to take the training process lightly. Most likely, he could not understand that his boxing career was collapsing. The boxer was able to take revenge on Denis Williams, whom he had previously lost. But in 2007 Harrison, for the first time in his career,loses by knockout to Englishman Michael Sprott. Later, he again suffers a defeat by decision of the judges from Briton Martin Rogan.

Harison after failures still thought about his career. Audley did not perform for about a year, and after returning to the ring, he began to have a white streak, which lasted for a short period. Harrison won the Prizefighter tournament.

After that, he won by knockout over Michael Sprott, taking revenge, and became the champion of Europe. Thanks to these successes, the boxer was able to enter the championship fight (according to one of the most prestigious versions) against the current WBA world champion, Briton David Haye.

Before the fight, Harrison stated that he would knock out his opponent. But the fight was far from in favor of Audley. After spending two and a half rounds of the fight, Harrison was unable to land more than one blow that reached the target, and missed as many as 33.

David Hay in the third round began to attack rapidly, he was much faster than Audley and inferior to him in size. Hay was able to cut down his opponent on the floor of the ring. After the referee counted out, Hay hit hard again and Audley couldn't answer him. The referee decided to stop the fight.

End of sports career

Audley Harrison is a retired professional boxer. He won the first recovery fight. In the second fight, he met with Briton David Price and was knocked out in the first round. Harrison was able to win for the second time in the Prizefighter tournament. After her, he was again knocked out in 2013 inthe first round of the American boxer Deontay Wilder, who currently holds the world title, according to the most prestigious version of the WBC. After this fight, Audley announced his retirement from professional football, but later decided to return to the sport.

Audley Harrison: career, summary

Audley could not even come close to the achievements that his compatriot Lennox Lewis had. It seemed to many that, having such physical data and Olympic gold in his asset, he had a great future in professional sports. The BBC channel signed an excellent and promising contract with the boxer, but Audley Harrison could not become a bright boxing star and even a one-day champion. He was close to the world championship title, but he could not conquer this peak. On March 26, 2015, at the age of 43, British heavyweight Audley Harrison announced his retirement from boxing.