Punchers from the Past: LaMAR CLARK

LaMAR CLARK

Born 1 December 1933 Cedar City Utah

Died 5 November 2006 Utah

Record: 46 fights 43 wins 3 losses (41 wins by KO/TKO, 28 in the first round).

Weight Division: Heavyweight

-Had his first professional fight 4 January 1958 winning on points over six rounds.

-After his 4 January fight he then had 29 more fights 1958 winning all 29 by KO/TKO:

On five occasions 1958 he had more than one fight a night:

13 October = Two-both first round KO/TKOs

10 November= Three-two first round TKO/KO’s and one second round TKO/KO

28 November = Two-one first round TKO/KO and one second round KO/TKO

1 December= Six fights on the same night – five first round KO/TKO’s and one second round KO/TKO. In all he had a total of 10 fights in the month of December.

-He had 10 fights in 1959 winning all by KO/TKO

-He scored two wins by first round KO/TKO  in February 1960 making a total of 41 consecutive wins by KO/TKO which is still the all-time record in boxing.*

-8 April 1960 his run of 42 consecutive wins was broken as he lost on a ninth round stoppage against Dominican Bartolo Soto

– 29 June 1906 he lost on a tenth round stoppage against Pete Rademacher ( Rademacher, an Olympic gold medal winner at the 1956 Olympic Games also made history as the only fighter to have fought for the world heavyweight title in his first professional fight losing to Floyd Patterson in a title challenge in 22 August 1957. Rademacher floored Patterson in the second round but was knocked down seven times and kayoed in the sixth round).

– He scored a second round kayo win over Chuck Wilburn on 4 March 1961

– On 19 April 1961 he fought Cassius Clay (Muhammad Ali). It was Clay/Ali’s sixth pro fight and Clark was floored twice and counted out and also suffered a broken nose.

-Clark retired at the age of 27 after the Clay/Ali fight.

Clark was a chicken farmer who had some success in local regional Golden Gloves and AAU tournaments putting together a reported 25-2 record. After his father died in a fire Clark decided to try his luck as a professional. He signed with Merv Jensen becoming a stable partner to middleweight champion Gene Fullmer and Gene’s brothers Don and Jay. Clark’s fighting style much resembled Gene’s as a rough, tough, mauling brawler and Ali actually admitted he had been impressed by Clark’s power. Almost all of Clark’s fights up to his loss against Soni had either little or no previous experience. One of the most experienced fighters he faced was Tony Burton who had a 10-2-1 record when Clark knocked him out in the fourth round in their fight in April 1959 (the fight was refereed by Jack Dempsey and Burton went on to appear in the Rocky films). Despite the poor quality of his opponents the fights he had met the requirements of the local boxing authorities so it is viewed as a genuine record.

After retirement Clark settled back to family life with his wife and four daughters.

* Some sources have credited Clark with a run of 42 or 44 consecutive wins by KO/TKO (The Guiness Book of Records  goes with 44) putting him ahead of “Blackjack” Billy Fox who was said to have won 43 consecutive KO’s but more recent research gives Clark 41 and Fox 36 so I have gone with those figures.