When Donald McRae was a young sportswriter, Hugh McIlvanney told him one night at a bar in Las Vegas that as he made a life covering boxing, “ambivalence will be your constant companion”. McRae found the romantic in boxing and particularly in boxers. He was drawn to fighters and trainers rather than promoters and advisers. His gifts as an interviewer meant that men like Tyson Fury revealed their vulnerabilities to him. But, as he writes in his new book, The Last Bell, even “the zealots grow weary”. On Free State today, Don McRae joins Dion and Joe to talk about his obsession with boxing, how he fell out of love with it and why his new book is a journey into the darkness of the ring. He speaks to about the great Belfast trainer Gerry Storey, Sugar Ray Leonard and Roberto Duran. He recalls his own father’s incredible life, defying the apartheid laws in South Africa to meet the ANC in Soweto while Nelson Mandela was in jail to bring electricity to the townships. At a time of personal grief, McRae lost himself in boxing again, but in a sport that has grown increasingly ugly, is it possible to be anything but ambivalent? And what does the decline of boxing tell us about the fate of all professional sport?

Free State with Joe Brolly and Dion Fanning is a Gold Hat Production in association with SwanMcG.

For more on Free State: https://freestatepodcast.com/

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