There was no question that he was the best promoter I’ve ever met. It was 50 years ago that Muhammad Ali was my first promotion. Here I was, faced with my first promotion and faced with a lot of political difficulty because he had made the remark about not going into the army and they threw us out of the country and we ended up in Toronto, and yet when he had great promotional ideas to sell a fight he would whisper them to me, let me follow through and get them done and that’s why a lot of people would come to me and give me credit for brilliant promotional ideas, which was very embarrassing because it wasn’t my idea, it was his.
I think my whole personality as a promoter and the things I say were taught to me by Muhammad Ali. People look at me compared to other promoters and one thing they recognise is how outspoken I am about everything. I don’t hold back. That’s something I learned by example from Ali.
In our time and probably in the generations to come Muhammad Ali will be remembered and not be forgotten. I think he remains worthy of a National Holiday in America. From the standpoint of impact on people, not only in the United States but all over the world, he’s the most significant sportsperson of my time, certainly. I don’t even know who compares. He was part of the history of our time and he will be recognised in history books as part of the history of the United States and the history of the world.
When I think back, I saw him reach out to common people all over the world. It mattered not what the person’s status in life was. Ali was truly compassionate. He truly cared about people. He was in that way the most gentle of human beings.
Bob Arum, Ali’s promoter
John Thomas McNamara
Jockey (born 1975), died aged 41, three years after being paralysed in a fall at the Cheltenham Festival
I was finishing my career as a point-to-point jockey just as JT was starting. It was clear early on he had something special and when I retired and started training he was the obvious choice for me to use on my cross-country horses and point-to-pointers.
I’ve never known someone with his loyalty. When he came in to ride he was always 10 minutes early, he had a professionalism with regard to his riding that was exemplary; he walked every track and as a teetotal non-smoker you always knew you had a bit of an edge with him on your horses. He must have ridden well over 100 winners for me.
He definitely had his own sense of humour, I suppose the best way of describing it was as a bit wary. He definitely didn’t suffer fools full stop let alone gladly. When he was giving you a lift back from the pub and he’d tell you he was leaving in 10 minutes, if you weren’t out there in nine he would be gone without you.