Lennox Lewis first came to the attraction of the world during the 1988 Summer Olympics at Seoul, South Korea. Lewis stunned the competition by winning the gold medal for Canada. Following up that spectacular introduction to the world, he turned pro in1989 and quickly proved that the Olympic games were no fluke. It took him just 13 bouts to earn a shot at the European championship. He won that championship and then returned to England in March of 1991, to fight Gary Mason for the England title which he had skipped on his way to the European belt. Mason was the victim of a 7th round TKO. The next step toward boxing immortality was a face off against Razor Ruddock which would determine who would fight Riddick Bowe for the WBC title. He took just 2 rounds to down Ruddock. The WBC belt became Lewis's shortly thereafter when Bowe decided to give up his belt without fighting  by dumping the championship belt into a garbage can. Lewis's first setback came in September of 1994 when after several successful defense fights, Lewis was knocked out by Oliver McCall in the second round. Three years later, in 1997 Lewis finally got his rematch with McCall who he beat in the fifth round.

The biggest matches in boxing in modern times are the unification fights which match up the WBC and the IBF champions for a fight where the winner will take both titles and be the undisputed champion of the world. Just such a match was set for March of 1999 between Lewis and the IBF champion Evander Holyfield. It had looked like Lewis had won the fight in a convincing manner when the judges came down with a split decision.

This of course required that another fight be schedules and eight months later Holyfield and Lewis again entered the ring to slug it out.  This time however Lewis soundly beat Holyfield and became the first world champion from England since 1897 when Bob Fitzsimmons had held the title.  Lewis cruised through his next few title defenses and  must have felt he would cruise through his fight with Hasim Rahman in April of 2001 in South Africa. Lewis looked slow and out of shape and in the 5th round Rahman floored him with a monster right and took the title away. As with previous setbacks, Lewis took stock and got back into form and in November of 2001 he entered the ring for a re-match with Rahman. Lewis was superb and destroyed Rahman in 4 rounds to regain his world heavyweight title for the 3rd time.

This set Lewis up for the fight the world was clamoring to see against boxing's bad boy Mike Tyson.  The fight was set for June of 2002 and Lewis was ready. By round eight Tyson was a battered beaten fighter and with one punch

Lewis sent Tyson crashing down where he received his 10 count and was gone. Lewis stepped into the ring in June of 2003 for a title defense against Vitali Klitschko and although the fight was stopped after the 6th and awarded to Lewis, it was apparent that his former skills were waning. His decision to retire as the title holder of the world championship belts makes him just the 3rd boxer in history to leave the sport on top, the other two being Gene Tunney and Rocky Marciano.

Lewis had brought back the glory and tradition of the sport of boxing to England in a style and manner that shed glory on his reputation as a great fighter. At age 38 only time will tell if he is able to resist that tempting call to get back in the ring, one more time.