Rocky Marciano remains a legendary figure in the world of professional boxing as the only heavyweight champion to retire completely undefeated. While fans celebrate his perfect forty-nine and zero record, his journey to the top involved many strange detours and intense personal sacrifices. Indeed, he originally pursued a career on the baseball diamond before discovering his devastating punching power in the army. Furthermore, his relentless training habits and granite chin turned him into an unstoppable force in the ring.
Rocky Marciano
Rocky Marciano began his boxing career late at the age of twenty-three while serving in the United States Army. Usually, elite fighters start training as children, but he only used the sport to avoid undesirable kitchen duties.
Before he committed to the ring, he tried out as a catcher for the Chicago Cubs baseball team. However, a lingering arm injury prevented him from throwing accurately to second base, so he returned home to Brockton.
His real name was Rocco Francis Marchegiano, but announcers struggled to pronounce his Italian surname during his early fights. Therefore, he adopted the simpler name Marciano to make it easier for fans and journalists to remember him.
The champion possessed the shortest reach of any heavyweight title holder in history at only sixty-eight inches. To compensate, his trainer Charley Goldman taught him a deep crouch that made him a much smaller target for opponents.
Remarkably, Marciano is the only heavyweight champion to knock out every single opponent he faced for the world title. He defended his crown six times and finished each of those challengers before the final bell rang.
He used a custom-made three-hundred-pound heavy bag that was significantly larger than the standard equipment used by other boxers. This massive bag helped him develop the explosive power needed to break through the guards of much larger men.
His conditioning was so legendary that he often ran between seven and ten miles every single day of the year. In addition, he practiced shadow-boxing for forty-five minutes while standing shoulder-deep in a swimming pool to build resistance.
Marciano often ran uphill at full speed and then immediately ran back down the slope backward to strengthen his legs. This bizarre routine gave him the incredible stamina required to maintain a high pace for fifteen full rounds.
Surprisingly, the hospital mistakenly registered him as a girl on his birth certificate when he was born in 1923. His parents corrected the error quickly, yet the funny clerical mistake remains a curious part of his early history.
During his peak years, he lived like a monk and completely abstained from any social life during his training camps. He even refused to speak with his wife on the phone to maintain his absolute focus on the fight.
He possessed a “chin of granite” and was only knocked down twice during his entire professional career of forty-nine fights. Both times he hit the canvas, he rose quickly to eventually knock out the men who had dropped him.
Scientists once tested his punch and found it had more explosive energy than an armor-piercing bullet from a high-powered rifle. This terrifying power allowed him to win over eighty-seven percent of his matches by way of a knockout.
He famously knocked Joe Louis out of the ring in 1951, which forced the legendary former champion into permanent retirement. Afterward, Marciano cried in the locker room because he felt deep sadness for defeating his own childhood hero.
Despite earning over four million dollars, he was notoriously frugal and often hid large amounts of cash in curtain rods. He distrusted banks and his own manager, so he preferred to keep his wealth tucked away in secret spots.
Finally, the legendary fighter died in a tragic small-plane crash just one day before his forty-sixth birthday in 1969. The sports world mourned the loss of a man who never lost a single battle inside the professional ring.
