Biographie

Trademark phrase: "Floats like a butterfly and stings like a bee"

Predicting the round in which his opponents would fall, sometimes even down to the minute

The Ali Shuffle

Boastful behaviour

Extraordinary speed and agility in addition to devastatingly powerful blows

He first decided to take boxing lessons when neighborhood bullies stole his bike and he wanted to get back at them.

Legend has it that Ali threw his 1960 Olympic gold medal into the river, when in reality he just simply lost it at some point in time.

His bout with massive underdog Chuck Wepner inspired Sylvester Stallone to create Rocky Balboa, while the character Apollo Creed (played by Carl Weathers) was based on Ali himself.

Ali learned early from the outrageous bad-guy wrestler, Gorgeous George, that it could pay to be hated. Ali said "I saw fifteen thousand people coming to see this man get beat, and his talking did it. I said, this is a goo-o-o-d idea!" Then Ali refined that talking concept to what has been referred to as the Louisville Lip.

Met The Beatles while training to fight Sonny Liston, and posed for photos with them in a boxing ring. Declared afterward that they were the greatest, but he was "still the prettiest".

Service to others is the rent you pay for your room here on earth.

I am an astronaut of boxing. Joe Louis and Jack Dempsey were just jet pilots. I'm in a world of my own.

At home I am a nice guy - but I don't want the world to know. Humble people, I've found, don't get very far.

When you're as great as I am, it's hard to be humble.

It's just a job. Grass grows, birds fly, waves pound the sand. I beat people up.