Self-control is one of the most prized assets in an athlete’s armoury: the ability to stay focused when all around you is descending into mayhem, the mental toughness to remain switched on for the duration of your contest.

Think about how Andy Murray shouts and swears on the tennis court.  He may sound like he’s losing his temper, but actually he is just letting off steam in an attempt to remain calm.  Murray is a big fan of the sport of boxing, because he can see many similarities between it and his own speciality game.  A one-on-one duel, where more often than not it is a battle of minds over a clash of bodies.

So how, in that case, does a boxer keep his cool?  How can he or she remain calm when their opponent is trying to smash their nose into smithereens? In The Winning Zone spoke to the WBU Lightweight champion, Lee McAllister, to find out the secret to his self-control...

“To be a boxer you have to be disciplined and that is the number one rule,” explains the ‘Aberdeen Assassin’, sitting in his sweaty shorts and t-shirt in the dugouts of Pittodrie after a training run.  “You get your discipline from punching the bags, learning to take breaks and not messing about.  I have learnt that over the years.  It will now stay with me all my life.”

McAllister admits that as a younger boxer he struggled with his temperament, but with his discipline in training and in life has come his new found maturity and control in the ring.

“In my amateur days a big problem of mine was that I couldn’t control the head. A lot of people will remember when I was amateur and I used to lose the head for nothing, but in my last fight the guy was head-butting me, elbowing me, nibbling at my shoulders, punching me in the groin, but I remained composed.”

Lee puts his ability to focus on the job at and down to two things.  First, the fact that, despite his success – being the first man from Aberdeen to become a world champion – he retains a level of humility.  He doesn’t get above his station, or consider himself a superstar. 

“The thing that a lot of people will notice about me is the fact that I am who I am. I am not here to get above myself. I am a boxer and I do it because I love doing it. I don’t do it for the money and don’t do it for anyone.  I do it for the titles and the fact that I enjoy boxing. I love going in fighting and I love to please the fans. I don’t get carried away with myself and I don’t think I am bigger and better than what I am.  I am just Lee McAlister, but when it comes to stepping into the ring, I am the Aberdeen Assassin.

“A lot of people get carried away with themselves. A lot of footballers can get carried away with all the hype.  But I get more pressure on me in the ring than a footballer will because it is me against someone else.  If they [footballers] want to go out the night before a game and they have a bad game, they will maybe get substituted, but I can’t get substituted six rounds into a fight! I just have to get on with it and take all the lumps and bumps.  I have to be 100% focused all the time and that’s why I can’t get ahead of myself.”

The second factor that influences his mindset is that, at heart, Lee is a family man.  His parents, siblings, wife and soon-to-be-born daughter are the number one priorities in his life.  He puts a lot of his success down to the commitment and encouragement of his mother and father.

“My dad has trained me since I was ten. He has always said that even from a young age I could be World Champion and he was right. I look up to my dad as he’s my biggest inspiration.  My dad is a keen boxer.  My brothers are all boxers and we are the only family of four brothers to all win Scottish Titles.

“All through the years of my boxing, my mum always cooked all my meals – my tuna, pasta, chicken and rice.  My mum did all of that and my dad did all my training.  So I owe everything to them really.”

With a nickname like ‘The Aberdeen Assassin’, and taking to the ring with sprigs of bright white and blood red hair sprouting from his skull, some people may find it difficult to fully comprehend how a man who, in his words, is ‘trained to punch people in the face’ can have such a calm demeanour.  People sometimes expect boxers to be like barbarians, brutal and violent, like Mike Tyson.

But for every Iron Mike there is a Frank Bruno – a gentleman at heart who does his talking between the ropes.  Ultimately, like Andy Murray or James McFadden, Lee is just a professional athlete.  And it is heartening to know that, in his spare time, Lee enjoys the most tranquil of all sporting hobbies: fishing.

“I started it because there is a lot of stress in boxing.  I’m not even bothered if I catch anything.  I just throw in a rod and chill out.  The other day I was reading my boxing news magazine while my rod was in the water.  I didn’t catch anything but it was good to chill out and relax. I stayed there for about an hour.

So does he see the irony in a professional fighter enjoying such peaceful past-time? 

“Well, opposites attract, I suppose.  It takes me away from the fighting and aggression I deal with all the time.  When you leave the gym you have to come back to reality and realise that you are not fighting machine out here, I am a husband, and I am a normal person.”

Lee may see himself as a normal person, but as he sits in the sunshine in his shorts, he does something that makes it very clear that, in some ways, he is actually a super-human.  

Straightening out the first two fingers of his right hand, he prods them into the middle of his thigh.  Rather than encountering resistance, they sink right into the centre of his leg, almost as far as the bone, as if his thigh were hollow.  Well, in fact, it is.  The reason why Lee can perform such an unworldly trick, unfortunately, is not a very pleasant one.

About four years ago, on holidays in the Greek island of Crete, Lee was knocked off a hired moped by a car.   He was almost killed, and the extent of his injuries were horrifying.

“I had a snapped leg, I needed about 1000 stitches.  The handle-bars went through my belly, and I had my spleen removed. Two eye sockets got crushed and I took injuries to my cheek-bone and jaw; pretty much everything.  My face had to be rebuilt.”

His injuries were so severe that he was warned he may never walk again.  And boxing was completely out of the question, the doctors said.  But Lee, being Lee, focused on defying that prediction.

“I have always been strong minded.  People used to say to me if I didn’t fight again it wouldn’t matter, boxing is not the be-all-and-end-all, and you can do other things.  But when someone is saying that you can’t do something then you automatically rebel against it, don’t you?
 
“I knew I could do it. My dad gave me a kick up the behind and told me to get on with it. To start with when I first got home with crutches it was a bit of a sad sight to be honest. My brothers had to bath me and lift me into the bath, and I was only about 7 stone.

“The doctors always told me that I would never fight again due to all the metal in my head and saying if I was punched in the stomach then I wouldn’t be able to handle it and would have a good chance of internal bleeding. So I booked myself into the hospital and got all the metal plates out of my head.  I applied for my licence and got a doctor to check me over and he said I was fine to fight!”

Now, in 2008, the world champion is arguably Scotland’s most successful boxer, and almost certainly it’s biggest miracle story.  He may not have the crowd-drawing capacity of Alex Arthur or the profile of Scott Harrison, but his record – 25 wins from 26 fights – says it all.  And, judging from his comeback from near-death, it will take a considerable opponent to take away his crown.

RO
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