Donovan Ruddock Launches Return to Boxing Glory Saturday Night in Mississauga
TORONTO, ON (May 9, 2012) – In the late 80’s and early 90’s he was the most feared heavyweight on the planet.
Bone-chilling knockout after bone-chilling knockout drove then champions Evander Holyfield, George Foreman, and Riddick Bowe into hiding.
Now, after carving a path of destruction through the last great heavyweight era, and going nineteen rounds against the most ferocious heavyweight of all time in “Iron” Mike Tyson, Donovan “Razor” Ruddock is ready to reclaim the Canadian Heavyweight crown that he never lost in the ring, and ultimately earn the world title shot that was denied him some twenty years ago.
This Saturday night at Mississauga’s Hershey’s Centre, Ruddock will make his comeback official, and give the crowd a sneak peek at one of the most startling athletic transformations in recent memory.
Eleven years after his final fight, a spectacularly chiselled, lean, and dangerous 48 year-old Ruddock is ready to breathe new life back into the comatose heavyweight scene.
“I’ve never been in this shape in my life,” the 211 lb. Ruddock beamed.
“I always got by on my ability, and trained as hard as I knew how back in the day. But now I know so much more. Not just about boxing, but myself as well.”
Be warned, the 2012 version of Donovan Ruddock isn’t venturing on a stereotypical boxing comeback. Unlike other boxers who step back in to the ring, Ruddock (38-5-1, 29 KO’s) was never pounded into retirement in the first place. After suffering his final defeat – a controversial TKO loss to Tommy Morrison in June of 1995 – a much heavier “Razor” returned from a three year hiatus to go on a 10-0 rampage that included 9 KO’s, before a shoulder injury forced him to hang up the gloves in 2001.
“At this weight I feel even faster, stronger and more lethal than when I had ringside doctors running all over the place,” Ruddock said.
Ruddock is hoping that a busy summer – consisting of at least three fights – will culminate in a clash with reigning Canadian Heavyweight champion Neven Pajkic.
“First thing, I want my Canadian Heavyweight title back.”
“I really respect Neven. He’s a warrior who carries the title with class and pride. But, sadly for him, he’s wearing the belt that I want.”
“Then when Neven is healing up, hopefully he’ll take some comfort in the fact that I’ll be putting Tyson Fury, Chris Arreola, Derrick Chisora, David Haye, Bermane Stiverne, Seth Mitchell, and Tomasz Adamek, on the exact same pudding diet too.”
“And after I feast on the appetizers, I’ll dive in for two helpings of Chicken Kiev,” Ruddock, an avowed vegan, said of facing the current heavyweight kingpins, Ukrainians Vitaly and Wladimir Klitschko.
“The older brother (WBC Heavyweight champ Vitaly) avoided me 11 years ago, and now he has to pay. And the younger one (WBA, IBF, WBO Heavyweight champ Wladimir) just bores me. I’ll have to knock him out too.”
As in September, I once again ran out of gas in the 10th & 11th championship rounds of October & November with this column, but I recovered to complete them and will unleash a few more flurries to close out the 12th and final round.
In the first week of October, Hassan N’Dam won a UD over Curtis Stevens in an eliminator for the right to challenge Jermaine Taylor who defeated aging Sam Soliman to regain the IBF Middleweight title. How Taylor even earned this title shot is another story altogether, but it is all irrelevant as he is now the champion. However he will not have too much time to savor his victory as he has assault and battery charges pending against him and an upcoming court fight that may turn out to be the toughest fight of his life, just when things started to look up for him in boxing, we wish him luck.
