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By Lyle Fitzsimmons - Don’t mourn too much for Freddie Roach.
Not because a guy battling the issues he’s battling doesn’t deserve your concern. But simply because there’s still no place that the former fighter and veteran trainer – who just celebrated birthday No. 54 last month – would rather be than where he is every single day.
The boxing ring. Or, as he labels it, his “comfort zone.”
“I’m doing great. I’m still working as hard as I can and with no problems,” he said. “I still do what I do every day and it doesn’t slow me down at all. As long as I’m in the boxing ring. I have no problems.”
The “it” Roach refers to, of course, is Parkinson’s disease, a malady he’s been openly battling for years while maintaining a blistering workout pace with an array of fighters at his Wild Card Boxing Club in Los Angeles – a labor, incidentally, that’s earned him nods as trainer of the year from the Boxing Writers Association of America in 2003, 2006, 2008-10 and 2013.
That’s all followed a high-profile fight career of his own, which stretched from 1978 to 1986, included 40 wins in 53 bouts and made him an ESPN staple who ultimately earned spotlight matches opposite future world champions Greg Haugen (TKO by 7) and Hector Camacho (L UD 10). [Click Here To Read More]
Not because a guy battling the issues he’s battling doesn’t deserve your concern. But simply because there’s still no place that the former fighter and veteran trainer – who just celebrated birthday No. 54 last month – would rather be than where he is every single day.
The boxing ring. Or, as he labels it, his “comfort zone.”
“I’m doing great. I’m still working as hard as I can and with no problems,” he said. “I still do what I do every day and it doesn’t slow me down at all. As long as I’m in the boxing ring. I have no problems.”
The “it” Roach refers to, of course, is Parkinson’s disease, a malady he’s been openly battling for years while maintaining a blistering workout pace with an array of fighters at his Wild Card Boxing Club in Los Angeles – a labor, incidentally, that’s earned him nods as trainer of the year from the Boxing Writers Association of America in 2003, 2006, 2008-10 and 2013.
That’s all followed a high-profile fight career of his own, which stretched from 1978 to 1986, included 40 wins in 53 bouts and made him an ESPN staple who ultimately earned spotlight matches opposite future world champions Greg Haugen (TKO by 7) and Hector Camacho (L UD 10). [Click Here To Read More]
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