Boxing (pugilism, prize fighting, the sweet science or in Greek pygmachia) is a combat sport in which two people engage in a contest of strength, reflexes, and endurance by throwing punches at an opponent with gloved hands.
Amateur boxing is an Olympic and Commonwealth sport and is a common fixture in most of the major international games - it also has its own World Championships. Boxing is supervised by a referee over a series of one- to three-minute intervals called rounds. The result is decided when an opponent is deemed incapable to continue by a referee, is disqualified for breaking a rule, resigns by throwing in a towel, or is pronounced the winner or loser based on the judges' scorecards at the end of the contest.
The birth hour of boxing as a sport may be its acceptance by the ancient Greeks as an Olympic game as early as 688 BC. Boxing evolved from 16th- and 18th-century prizefights, largely in Great Britain, to the forerunner of modern boxing in the mid-19th century, again initially in Great Britain and later in the United States. In 2004, ESPN ranked boxing as the most difficult sport in the world.
Read more about Boxing: Early History, Rules, Professional Vs. Amateur Boxing, Equipment, The Corner, Medical Concerns, Boxing Hall of Fame, Governing and Sanctioning Bodies, Boxer Rankings
Famous quotes containing the word boxing:
“I can entertain the proposition that life is a metaphor for boxing—for one of those bouts that go on and on, round following round, jabs, missed punches, clinches, nothing determined, again the bell and again and you and your opponent so evenly matched it’s impossible not to see that your opponent is you.... Life is like boxing in many unsettling respects. But boxing is only like boxing.”
—Joyce Carol Oates (b. 1938)
“... to paint with oil paints for the first time ... is like trying to make something exquisitely accurate and microscopically clear out of mud pies with boxing gloves on.”
—Brenda Ueland (1891–1985)