Rocky Marciano Biography

[Master]

6 months in too intense but agree he must have been a relentless force in his day. That training regime must have led to him having a short championship career because he retired through a bad back?

[Mars_ax]

6 months in too intense but agree he must have been a relentless force in his day. That training regime must have led to him having a short championship career because he retired through a bad back?

I've heard/read different things as to why Marciano retired, along with back problems, I read that Rocky had taken a lot of trauma to his head. I also read somewhere that Marciano decided that he wasn't going to give his Manager Al Weill another big chunk of his purses. To be honest I don't know the real reason.

A bit of trivia: A few years after Rocky retired in Sept. 1955, then Heavyweight Champion Floyd Patterson, was KO'd by Ingemar Johansson. Marciano considered a comeback, but after only a month of training in three years, he decided against it and never seriously considered a comeback again, that was in 1959.

BTW, Marciano was only around 32 when he retired, and on the eve of his 46th birthday when he died in August 1969. He was still a young dude.

[Master]

Yes I heard about Rocky being very keen and trying to make a fight with Johannson, which implies Rocky did not fancy beating Patterson and that Ignamer was not that good. I think he said his back was not able to allow him to get into fighting condition when he started on the punch bag.

I also heard he retired because of management issues and/or his wife did not want him to carry on fighting (or was that Dempsey?).

[John Cameron]

The biography on Marciano is now available at: Amazon.com: redemption the life and death of rocky marciano...