Nigel Benn (9 page)

Brian was, in my opinion, a little too exacting in the beginning. Sometimes I thought he was hurting me excessively. He used to work me hard but, apart from some misgivings, I still think he was a good trainer, and I had been used to a tough routine in the Army. Difficult though it was, his training was right up my street. I knew I was in good shape and he would try to stretch me as far as he could. He was a big part of my life in those early professional days. He tried to be a father figure and, at the time, I thought that everything he was doing was for my benefit.

However, a certain amount of disillusionment set in. He put his son Sean in my corner at fights to ‘keep it in the family’, but how could a 17-year-old boy be in my corner? Only mature men should have been there. My dad thought it was wrong but didn’t say anything. Afterwards, I thought that my brother John should have been my corner man. If we were going to keep it in the family, I would rather it was
my
family. After all, John had been a boxer. He was the one who introduced me to boxing and had encouraged me all along.

However, at the time I didn’t want to upset Brian because we were so close. He would invite me to his lovely big house in Upminster and we would go to boxing matches together. One of the problems with him was that he thought he was
right about everything. He had a jewellery shop in Hatton Garden, London, and another shop in Upminster and thought he was quite a powerful man and, like many successful men, that his influence could be applied to anything he was involved in. That didn’t take into account the fact that I, too, had a strong personality and ideas of my own.

He used to train me three times a day but there is only so much a body will take. When I left him, I cut down my training to twice a day. He was working me to the bone and I found I couldn’t take it any more. My body would say, ‘Don’t you think you are taking this too far?’ I wanted to listen to my instincts but Brian kept impressing on me the need for hard training. I now think that is not proven. I’ve proved through my own success that you don’t need to push things so far, that you should listen to what your body tells you and call it a day when you’ve had enough. No matter what any trainer might tell you, you can’t argue the case against solid facts and results. My argument is backed up by two world titles.

B
urt McCarthy was stinking rich. He was a multi-millionaire and cousin of former British Featherweight Champion Sammy McCarthy. Burt had a nose for talented prospects and could smell success where this Ilford boy was concerned. A lot of people were beating a path in my direction after the ABA victory. Burt got there first and became my manager. News of my fighting style spread rapidly — Nigel Benn had come to town. Or, to be more accurate, the boxing fraternity had at last recognised him and were bringing out their welcome mats. I was about to throw away my learner plates and cross over into the fast lane from where I would never look back. What a metamorphosis it was!

I'd already seen some trappings of wealth with Brian Lynch but now Burt was displaying his like a peacock showing off his feathers: the flash mansion in Danbury, Essex, a penthouse in the Barbican and limousines which would need a wide-angle lens to fit them in the picture. Forget the fact that his money had not come from boxing but from other
businesses. That didn't matter. It smelled good and I was hungry. ‘You carry on doing the business,' he told me, ‘and you'll get everything.'

Burt was a straight shooter and I respected his advice. He inspired me to pursue the material gains which were there for the taking in professional boxing, providing, of course, that you were tops. He arranged my first fight against Graeme Ahmed on 28 January 1987 at Croydon, for which I was promised a purse of £1,000. That was a fortune to me then.

My professional début was on a Wednesday evening. Man, that's a night I won't forget. I weighed in at 11st 7¾lb, Ahmed at 11st 6½lb. I was raring to go, straining at the leash. But I was nervous, man, really, really nervous — before this fight I was even training in my sleep.

I got out there and the crowd was going wild, with me just thinking, ‘I'm going to bash you, mate, I'm going to put you down.' I went for him in the first round, hitting him with some
heavy-duty
punches, but he stayed in close, and I couldn't quite nail him. I knew I had him in the second, though. As soon as the bell went, I put him down with a big left hook. He got up at nine, but went down twice more before the ref ended it.

I couldn't believe it was so easy, like counting 1-2-3. Respect to Ahmed, but it was a demolition job, and I felt great — £1,000 in my pocket, and he hadn't done me any damage. It was my first pro fight and it had gone the same way as all my army fights. But it was also my first lesson in professional fighting, which was a completely
different kettle of fish to amateur boxing. I'd become a lot calmer and more focused in my training, so, after a couple of days off for some serious partying with Sharron (£1,000 could buy you a good time, and in those days the money always went as fast as I could earn it), I was back slogging away, training for my second match against Kevin Roper at Basildon, which was scheduled for 4 March.

The Welshman was heavier than me but the referee stopped the fight after 40 seconds in the first round. I was really cheesed off that night because they had almost started taking down the ring when it was our turn to fight. We'd got there at about 8.00pm and it wasn't until after midnight that we fought. The crowds didn't know who I was yet and I just wanted to get it over and done with. I gave Roper a right uppercut to his face and he retreated into a corner clutching his left eye. He was hurt badly and referee Davis called it off.

My next fight was against Bob Nieuwenhuizen of the Netherlands at the Albert Hall. I think he was the tallest guy I ever fought. He was about 6ft 5in. I needed a step-ladder to smack him in the mouth, he was so big. I thought someone was taking the mickey pitching us together. Why hadn't they brought in someone who was only 5ft 2in? I threw a left hook and hit him. I assaulted his body,
Boom,
Boom,
Boom!
I was really rushing about in the first few fights. I was always in first gear, never had time to get into second. Eventually, Nieuwenhuizen threw a jab at me and I returned with a left hook and thought, good night, hello Las
Vegas! The referee rang the bell. The bigger they are, the harder they fall. The ref, Nick White, had stopped the fight after two minutes three seconds, even though the Dutchman beat the count and got up at eight.

Fight number four on Saturday, 9 May was against a good old pro, Winston Burnett, who was from Cardiff. This Welshman was a good campaigner and I reckon he wanted to survive to one hundred. However, I figured I'd put an end to that and, while he gave a good defence, I got him 45 seconds into the fourth round. I didn't think he came to fight. It seemed more like he was there to survive. He took a lot of punishment without reply but when he tried to smother me I landed a blow to the side of his head followed by a lot of punches to his body. I kept at him hammer and tongs in the fourth when referee Nathan stopped the fight.

The next month I fought American Reginald Marks at the Albert Hall, Kensington, and he was out in the first round. I remember him clearly. He wore blue shorts and he was smaller than me. I just gave it to him. I knocked him about like he was a dead body. I had him on the ropes and was whacking him in the body before sending him down with a right to the top of his head. He jumped up and
bang!
I walloped him again with a left hook. Although he got up at about nine, referee Sower reckoned he'd had enough and called time after two minutes ten seconds.

I was back at the Albert Hall two weeks later on 1 July, fighting another American, Leon Morris, who, like Marks, was from Louisiana. He was a big
guy who charged at me like a wounded buffalo. He punched me in the back of the head and on the side and then caught me behind the ear. I threw a left at him, which was more devastating, followed it through with another left hook and he went down like a lead weight. Somehow he wobbled up again after the count but couldn't stay there. He was like a baby learning to walk. They had to carry him out and he didn't know what time of day it was. The fight lasted 25 seconds of the scheduled eight rounds.

Eddie Smith had a good record and was a force to be reckoned with. He'd beaten Tony Sibson, Frank Wissenbach and Roy Gumbs in the past but went down to me after 68 seconds. A Manchester veteran, Eddie connected two left hooks to my head but I retaliated with a right uppercut and a damaging left hook followed by a series of left hooks. It was my seventh straight stoppage win and the fifth in one round.

Next, I stopped Winston Burnett for a second time in the third of six two-minute rounds at the Albert Hall on 16 September. Just before the bell went in the second, I hurt Burnett with a big right uppercut and then hammered him on the ropes. The ref, Sid Nathan, stopped the bout.

I'll never forget the punch I gave Russell Barker, a Scotsman from Nottingham. People thought I'd killed him. He was a same-day substitute for Frank Warren's Seconds Out series.

Fight after fight, victory after victory, the money began rolling in and mounting up. People began to recognise me in the street, the boxing
groupies couldn't get to the powder room fast enough. Did someone say fight groupies liked boxers because they were thick and strong?

When I started out, my ambitions were to own a terraced house and a BMW. Within months of turning pro, I had more offers of cars than I knew what to do with. Car dealers would sponsor me with BMWs, others would lend me their flashiest motors. One dealer had my name in huge letters down the side of the car. I was more conspicuous than a double-decker bus and didn't like that at all. It was uncanny being able to drive any car I wanted. I'd only recently got a driving licence and my only advanced training, necessary for some of the high-powered vehicles offered, was crashing into a lamp-post at Ford's.

I became a celebrity overnight. Only 18 months previously, I'd been on the dole and catching buses everywhere — providing I could afford them, which was not always the case. Stardom was bound to go to my head and it did, at least until I became accustomed to it. Amateur boxing had given me prizes but no cash. The only money I had received was from the social security office: about £38 a week, with which I had to support Sharron and Dominic while living in a hostel that gave us no privacy.

Our daughter Sadé (we pronounce her name Shaaday) was born the following year on 14 October 1987. She was the first girl in the family. All my brothers had produced boys up to that point and I was over the moon. My parents had always wanted a girl and now I had come up with
the goods. I gave Mum what she had always wanted. Sadé was a cheerful, smiling, lovely little girl. I was overawed. But what a handful! She's DC — different class. Someone suggested to me recently that she might give me trouble when she grows up. I responded, ‘No, she'll give someone else trouble. A young man will come to me one day and say, “Mr Benn, your daughter's breaking my ass.” I'll say, “Hell, what do you think I had from the mother, then? All right? So leave it now and stop knocking on my door, or I'll set my Rottweiler on you. Piss off and leave me alone.”'

Burt McCarthy was a good, clean, honest man who never took money off me until I got going. Sometimes I felt he pampered me too much. I wanted to get out there and fight and I mean
fight,
go at it hammer and tongs. But he gave me dead bodies to knock out. After a while, Burt wasn't sure that he could give 100 per cent to me. ‘That could be unfair to a talent such as his. I might regret the decision a thousand times, but I can't do things by half. I feel it's better to leave him to somebody else,' he said. It was 1987, and after about 12 fights, I changed managers and went for one who had a lot more clout — Frank Warren.

Frank was confident about my prospects. He told the world that I could become a millionaire within the next three years and insisted I could take over from Frank Bruno as the biggest draw in British boxing. How right he was!

At the start, Frank Warren got me the fights I wanted. You get to a stage where you can't find mugs any more and you have to fight top guys.
Frank told me, ‘You want a title fight? I'll get you one.' And he did. Before we fell out, Frank was very kind to me. He lent me £10,000 as a deposit on my first house which I bought with Sharron in East Ham in 1988.

Ronnie Yeo became my next victim at Bethnal Green on 3 November. He was from Tennessee and a very experienced boxer. He actually threw a punch at me and, before it could connect, mine had already struck him like an Exocet. It was a single punch knock-out and the referee didn't even bother taking up a count. Yeo crashed to the canvas in 57
seconds of the first round. He was really hurt.

Ian Chantler was a southpaw (left-handed) who helped create the record for my fastest fight. I laid him out in 16 seconds. He was like a new-born foal trying to get up and not quite making it. While he was on the floor, he made swimming and flying motions like a clumsy swan. That was my quickest KO ever. All he had time to do was walk to the centre of the ring and try three jabs — none of which connected.

My twelfth and final fight in my first year as a professional was a milestone in every sense of the word. It was against Reggie Miller at the Albert Hall on 2 December and I KO'd him in the seventh, but he made me work for it. This was the longest I'd ever fought. Up until this time, my fights had never gone beyond the fourth round. I thought that if he could stay on his feet he might even snatch victory so I had to pull it out of the bag. He made me realise there was another level which I had not yet reached. The Dark Destroyer wasn't doing his
job fast enough on this one and Miller was the only person who ever made me feel that I had to change.

I wasn't expecting such a hard fight but I was, nevertheless, confident that I would win. He was taller than me, and two pounds heavier, and he had me on the ropes a few times. The only time I got him, I went
boom
with my left and it exploded on his chin. He went down and his legs caved in. It was a good fight and I was pleased for the competition. I should have been fighting American Kenny ‘The Blizzard' Snow who had won 28 of his 30 fights but he had to cancel. After the fight I felt proud of myself because I had wanted to prove I wasn't a one-minute wonder knocking over bums and I did that. Miller was a somebody, his record showed that and he caught me with some good hooks. I had showed the critics that I could take a good punch as well as give one.

By this time I was itching for a title fight, impatient for a place on the world ratings list which only my idols, Mike Tyson, who was number one heavyweight and WBC, WBA and IBF champion, and Marvin Hagler, number one middleweight, appeared. The middleweight list gave me most of my targets. At that time, the 15 top fighters were Marvin Hagler (USA), Thomas Hearns (USA), Sumbu Kalambay (Italy), Frank Tate (USA), Mike Nunn (USA), Mike McCallum (Jamaica), Michael Olajide (Canada), Herol Graham (England), Chong Pal Park (Korea), Lindell Holmes (USA), Robbie Sims (USA), Donald Lee (USA), Tony Sibson (England) and Roberto
Duran (Panama). I wanted to see the name Nigel Benn in the number one slot.

My career was to change dramatically after a chance meeting with Ambrose Mendy at a club in the West End. It was on the night I had been lent a Bentley by Richard Clements, a car dealer, and pretended to everyone that I owned it. I was only 24, and went with three mates to various clubs up West, giving it
large
. Extra large, in fact. When I drove the car, people showed a lot of respect and courtesy. I thought it was me at first, but then I realised it was the car they were admiring. I suppose that's when my love of flash cars started.

Ambrose and I started chatting and he was giving me all these big words. I was impressed. He was DC — he looked good, dressed expensively, talked big. I thought he was the business. He was the first black man I had seen who I thought had it all. I'd never met anyone like him before. I thought he was the best thing since sliced bread. Afterwards, he invited me to his large home in Wanstead. This was real money. A swimming pool in the back garden and two Mercedes parked in the drive. Here was a man who had done very well for himself. He was giving me a lot of patter — so much that I thought this is the man for me.