Quotes to inspire and reflect

When I was 14, and listening to the radio, and I heard the announcer: 'Still champion of the whole world – Rocky Marciano.' I knew I wanted to be champion. He was a big influence.

I am not the greatest, I’m the double greatest. Not only do I knock ‘em out, I pick the round. I’m the boldest, the prettiest, the most superior, most scientific, most skillfullest fighter in the ring today.

I told you all, all of my critics, that I was the greatest of all time. Never make me the underdog until I'm about 50 years old.

Champions aren't made in the gyms. Champions are made from something they have deep inside them: a desire, a dream, a vision. They have to have last-minute stamina, they have to be a little faster, they have to have the skill and the will. But the will must be stronger than the skill.

All through my life, I have been tested. My will has been tested, my courage has been tested, my strength has been tested. Now my patience and endurance are being tested.

I am the greatest, I'm the greatest that ever lived. I don't have a mark on my face.

Float like a butterfly, sting like a bee. The hands can't hit what the eyes can't see.

I'm the greatest, I'm a bad man, and I'm pretty.

There are no pleasures in a fight but some of my fights have been a pleasure to win.

No boxer in the history of boxing has had Parkinson's. There's no injury in my brain that suggests that the illness came from boxing.

Ever since I first came here in 1963 to fight Henry Cooper, I have loved the people of England.

If I said I would knock out Sonny Liston in 1 minute and 49 seconds of the first round, that would hurt the gate.

To make America the greatest is my goal, so I beat the Russian and I beat the Pole. And for the U.S.A. won the medal of gold. The Greeks said, 'You're better than the Cassius of old.

Joe Frazier got hit more than me - and he doesn't have Parkinson's.

I'm not the greatest; I'm the double greatest. Not only do I knock 'em out, I pick the round.

You can't keep your mind on fighting when you're thinking about a woman. You can't keep your concentration. You feel like sleeping all the time.

If you lose a big fight, it will worry you all of your life. It will plague you - until you get your revenge.

I should be a postage stamp, because that's the only way I'll ever get licked. I'm beautiful. I'm fast. I'm so mean I make medicine sick. I can't possibly be beat.

When I won the Golden Gloves in 1960 that made me realize I had a chance. And when I won at the Olympics that sealed it: I was the champ.

I always bring out the best in men I fight, but Joe Frazier, I'll tell the world right now, brings out the best in me. I'm gonna tell ya, that's one helluva man, and God bless him.

I calculate that I took 20,000 punches, but I earned millions and kept a lot of it. I may talk slow, but my mind is OK.

No one knows what to say in the loser's locker room.

They can boo me, yell at me and throw peanuts at me – as long as they pay to get in.

I never thought of losing, but now that it's happened, the only thing is to do it right. That's my obligation to all the people who believe in me. We all have to take defeats in life.

People don't realize what they had till it's gone. Like President Kennedy, there was no one like him, the Beatles, and my man Elvis Presley. I was the Elvis of boxing.

My trainer don't tell me nothing between rounds. I don't allow him to. I fight the fight. All I want to know is did I win the round. It's too late for advice.

I figured that if I said it enough, I would convince the world that I really was the greatest.

I have been so great in boxing they had to create an image like Rocky, a white image on the screen, to counteract my image in the ring. America has to have its white images, no matter where it gets them. Jesus, Wonder Woman, Tarzan and Rocky.

When I’m gone, boxing will be nothing again. The fans with the cigars and the hats turned down’ll be there, but no more housewives and little men in the street and foreign presidents. It’s goin’ to be back to the fighter who comes to town, smells a flower, visits a hospital, blows a horn and says he’s in shape. Old hat. I was the onliest boxer in history people asked questions like a senator.

I'm so fast I could hit you before God gets the news.

The man who will whip me will be fast, strong and hasn't been born yet.

I outwit them, and then I outhit them.

If you sign to fight me, you need speed and endurance but what you need most is to increase your insurance.

I want 15 referees to be at this fight because there ain’t no one man who can keep up with the pace I am gonna set, except me.

Never put your money against Cassius Clay, for you will never have a lucky day.

She was what we used to call a suicide blond — dyed by her own hand.

I speak two languages: English and Body.

Careful grooming may take twenty years off a woman's age, but you can't fool a flight of stairs.

When women kiss it always reminds me of prize fighters shaking hands.

The man's desire is for the woman; but the woman's desire is rarely other than for the desire of the man.

Curve: The loveliest distance between two points.

There is nothing wrong with a woman welcoming all men’s advances as long as they are in cash.

Every girl should use what Mother Nature gave her before Father Time takes it away.

I wish I had a twin, so I could know what I’d look like without plastic surgery.

Women who seek to be equal with men lack ambition.

She got her good looks from her father. He’s a plastic surgeon.

There is a difference between happiness and wisdom: he that thinks himself the happiest man is really so; but he that thinks himself the wisest is generally the greatest fool.

Doesn’t expecting the unexpected make the unexpected expected?