('New Yorker' magazine - Nov, 1961)
In the summer of 1955, while Archie Moore was training for his championship fight with Bobo Olson at the Polo Grounds, he took off 23 pounds, the last few at Ehsan's Training Camp, a dreary, unpainted sweat pit in Summit, New Jersey. His trainers closed the doors and windows of the gymnasium early every afternoon, quickly transforming it into a steam cabinet, and in this suffocating atmosphere Moore, swaddled in a skintight rubber costume, went through his ritual of shadowboxing, sparring, bag-punching, and rope-skipping, giving off sprays of water like a revolving lawn sprinkler. The close air was almost unbearable, but he drove himself furiously, and during the last 24 hours before the weigh-in had nothing to eat or drink except half a lemon. The method seemed extreme, particularly for a middle-aged athlete, but it was effective. Moore made the weight by two pounds and knocked out Olson in three rounds.
('New Yorker' magazine - Nov, 1961)
('New Yorker' magazine - Nov, 1961)
