Biography
Tanabe won the bronze medal at the 1960 Summer Olympics, held in Rome, becoming the first Japanese boxer to win an olympic medal. His amateur record was 115-5 (30RSC). He made his debut three years later, and easily won the Japanese flyweight title in 1965, which he defended twice before vacating. In February, 1967, he fought WBA flyweight champion Horacio Accavallo in a non-title match, and won by 6th round TKO.
Tanabe was scheduled to get his first world title shot in July, 1967, and expectations heightened around the talented fighter. However, it was discovered that he had suffered a detached retina in his right eye, which forced him into retirement. He had surgery on his right eye, but lost his vision two years later. His professional record was 21-0-1 (5KOs).
Read more about this topic: Kiyoshi Tanabe
Famous quotes containing the word biography:
“A biography is like a handshake down the years, that can become an arm-wrestle.”
—Richard Holmes (b. 1945)
“A great biography should, like the close of a great drama, leave behind it a feeling of serenity. We collect into a small bunch the flowers, the few flowers, which brought sweetness into a life, and present it as an offering to an accomplished destiny. It is the dying refrain of a completed song, the final verse of a finished poem.”
—André Maurois (1885–1967)
“Just how difficult it is to write biography can be reckoned by anybody who sits down and considers just how many people know the real truth about his or her love affairs.”
—Rebecca West [Cicily Isabel Fairfield] (1892–1983)