He held the Ring magazine heavyweight title from to , was the undisputed champion from to , and was the WBA and Ring heavyweight champion from to Born and raised in Louisville, Kentucky , he began training as an amateur boxer at age At 18, he won a gold medal in the light heavyweight division at the Summer Olympics and turned professional later that year. He joined the Nation of Islam in the early s, but later disavowed it in the mids.
He won the world heavyweight championship, defeating Sonny Liston in a major upset on February 25, , at age During that year, he denounced his birth name as a " slave name " and formally changed his name to Muhammad Ali. In , Ali refused to be drafted into the military, owing to his religious beliefs and ethical opposition to the Vietnam War , and was found guilty of draft evasion and stripped of his boxing titles.
He stayed out of prison while appealing the decision to the Supreme Court , where his conviction was overturned in He did not fight for nearly four years and lost a period of peak performance as an athlete.
Ali's actions as a conscientious objector to the Vietnam War made him an icon for the larger counterculture of the s generation, and became a prominent, high-profile figure of racial pride for African Americans during the civil rights movement and throughout his career. He fought in several historic boxing matches, including his highly publicized fights with Sonny Liston, Joe Frazier including the Fight of the Century , the biggest boxing event up until then , the Thrilla in Manila , and his fight with George Foreman in The Rumble in the Jungle.
Ali thrived in the spotlight at a time when many boxers let their managers do the talking, and he became renowned for his provocative and outlandish persona. He was famous for trash-talking , often free-styled with rhyme schemes and spoken word poetry , and has been recognized as a pioneer in hip hop. He often predicted in which round he would knock out his opponent. As a boxer, Ali was known for his unorthodox movement, fancy footwork, head movement, and rope-a-dope technique, among others.
