Laila Ali
Laila Ali
Laila Amaria Aliis an American former professional boxer who competed from 1999 to 2007. She is the daughter of the late heavyweight champion Muhammad Ali with his third wife, Veronica Porsche Ali, and is the eighth of her father's nine children. During her career, from which she retired undefeated, she held the WBC, WIBA, IWBF and IBA female super middleweight titles, and the IWBF light heavyweight title...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionBoxer
Date of Birth30 December 1977
CityMiami Beach, FL
CountryUnited States of America
I think that if you do want to be a fighter, then you need to work harder than everybody else and make sure that you surround yourself with good people, especially if you're a woman. You've got to find a team that takes you seriously as a female fighter and is not going to rush you into the ring before you're ready.
Focus on being balanced - success is balance.
I like to play by my own rules.
While I was boxing professionally, I never thought about my looks. The furthest thing from my mind was 'messing up my pretty face' when I was on my way to the ring to meet my opponent. Yet, people I'd meet along the way would always ask me if I was worried about my looks. Then they would go on to say that I was 'too pretty to box.'
Pregnancy isn't 'I can eat whatever I want,' because you have to remember you're going to be stuck with a lot of that weight afterwards that you need to try to get off.
Authenticity is very important - be true to one's self.
I was never offended that people underestimated me because of my appearance or that they thought I was pretty and discouraged me from fighting because they didn't want me to risk hurting my looks.
You have to fight for your health and stay on top of it. Our bodies are meant to be healthy.
I saw women's boxing on television for the first time when I was 18, and that's when I wanted to do it. So, it didn't come from me watching my father. I didn't know the sport existed; therefore, I wasn't really interested in it until I saw it.
People like to see me fight. A name can only take you so far. There are only a few fighters out of the thousands of boxers out there that have name recognition. I'm definitely not upset by that.
I have to get a workout in in the morning. Once my day starts, I'll have the best intentions, and it still won't happen: one of the kids needs to be picked up somewhere, I have to hop on a conference call, or I'm just tired. So I get it done in the A.M.
I have noticed a change in him, something that goes along with Parkinson's. Sometimes, his speech is so slurred, you can't hardly understand him. But he definitely knows what's going on. That's for sure. He sees everything.
I never ran with my dad. He was old-school. He had a whole different idea of training. He ran in steel-toed boots! But, of course, he's proud of me and proud of the boxer that I became.
I don't play video games. My husband does. He plays sometimes the football, and every once in a while when he gets bored, he'll do a little boxing in there. He gets into the football. You can trade players, and he keeps up with the whole aspect of the game, not just the game. He's a fanatic.