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Former WBF World Super
Middleweight Champion Robin
Reid was born in the village
of Sefton in Merseyside, England
on February 19 1971. He started
boxing at a young age, and
embarked on a very successful
amateur career, highlighted by
winning bronze at Light
Middleweight in the 1992
Barcelona Olympics.
In February of 1993 he turned
professional with a first round
stoppage of Mark Lee Dawson
(5-2) at the Goresbrook Leisure
Centre in East London suburb
Dagenham, as part of the
undercard of a British
Heavyweight title fight between
Herbie Hide and Michael Murray.
He won another four bouts
against the usual journeymen
opponents, before
disappointingly finishing his
first year in the paid ranks
with a six-round draw in
Manchester against Danny Juma
(0-1). While it was widely known
that Reid had a lot of talent,
the Juma encounter didn’t bode
too well for the future.
Reid got back to winning ways
though, and won his next sixteen
fights, including a rematch with
Juma, without too many problems.
However, despite his menacing
“Grim Reaper” moniker he had not
faced anyone of note, and most
of his triumphs came against
opponents with more losses than
victories.
So, with a 21-0-1 ledger but
without even a scheduled
ten-rounder on his resume, he
was not exactly a massive
favorite when he traveled to
Milan, Italy to challenge WBC
world champion Vincenzo
Nardiello (30-5) in October of
1996.
But, the 25-year-old Reid proved
his doubters wrong and fought
the local hero on even terms in
the first half of the fight,
before pulling off the upset by
stopping Nardiello, who had won
the crown only three months
earlier, in round seven.
Reid made three successful
defenses of the WBC title,
against Giovanni Pretorius
(22-0-1), Henry Wharton (25-2-1)
and Hacine Cherifi (24-2-1),
before losing it to
Thulani "Sugarboy"
Malinga
(41-10) just before Christmas of
1997. Both Malinga and Reid had
the WBF world title in their
future!
“The
Grim Reaper” fought only once in
1998, stopping Graham Townsend
(8-3) in April on a massive
Manchester bill promoted by
Frank Warren. It was a low
profile bout, but it eventually
proved to be the only action
Reid would see before getting a
shot against WBO world champion
Joe Calzaghe (25-0) ten months
later.
On February 13 1999 in
Newcastle, Reid gave Calzaghe,
who would eventually retire
undefeated at 46-0 and get
inducted into the International
Boxing Hall of Fame, what many
call one of his toughest fights.
But while one judge had Reid
winning 116-111, the other two
scored it the same for the
Welshman, awarding him the split
decision victory.
The great performance against
Calzaghe was followed by a
fourteen month lay-off, and when
Reid returned to the ring in
June of 2000 against Italian
Silvio Branco (39-4-2) he didn’t
look himself, losing a clear
unanimous decision on the Mike
Tyson vs. Lou Savarese undercard
at Hampden Park in Glasgow.
But Robin Reid was far from
done. His team secured him
another world title shot, and he
was scheduled to face Ron
Martinez for the vacant WBF
title the following December.
But the American failed his
medicals and, to save to show,
Reid fought late replacement
Mike Gormley (11-2) and proved
he was a level above with a
first round knockout.
While he ended up with a
somewhat easy assignment to win
his second world championship,
Reid had a very successful reign
as WBF champ. He made his first
defense in May 2001,
impressively stopping tough
Russian Roman Babaev (18-15-1)
in three rounds at the Wembley
Arena in London.
Next up was a fourth round
destruction of South African
Soon Botes (21-7) two months
later in Liverpool, before
another demolition job (KO 3) of
South American champion Jorge
Andres Sclarandi (26-16-1) from
Argentina in October.
Keeping an amazingly busy
schedule, Reid managed to
squeeze in fourth world title
defense before the end of that
year, putting on an impressive
performance to win a unanimous
decision over another
Argentinean, former WBA world
champion Julio Cesar Vasquez
(63-3).
Taking a deserved break, it
would be seven months before
Reid returned to the ring. But
again it would be against
Argentinean opposition, as
capable Francisco Antonio Mora
(34-5) was next in line with an
attempt to dethrone the WBF king
in July 2002 at the Wembley
Conference Centre in London.
Tough as they come, “El Chino”
Mora survived knockdowns in
rounds three and six to go the
full distance, doing his very
best to turn the tide, but in
the end Reid was too good for
him and retained his crown with
a clear unanimous decision.
This would be the last defense
Reid made of the WBF world
title. In his next four bouts he
stopped mediocre adversaries,
before getting a crack at WBA
and IBF champion Sven Ottke
(32-0) in Nuremberg, Germany on
December 13 2003.
Ottke won the fight by unanimous
decision, but in the aftermath referee
Roger Tilleman was heavily
criticized for a less-than-neutral
performance that massively
favoured the home-town hero.
After missing a knock-down in
round six
for Reid, instead ruling it a
slip, Tilleman deducted a point
from Reid for a phantom
head-butt.
The fight against Ottke proved
that Reid had plenty more to
offer at world level, and in
June 2004 he challenged Irishman
Brian Magee for his IBO world
title at the legendary Kings
Hall in Belfast.
Making his eighth defense of a
very impressive reign, Magee was
considered the favorite but Reid
silenced the loud local fans by
scoring four knock-downs and a
deserved unanimous decision to
lift his third world
championship in very impressive
fashion.
The Magee fight turned out to be
the last big victory for Reid.
He won a stay-busy fight over
six rounds in February 2005
against Ramdane Serdjane
(17-16-2), and then lost (TKO 7)
his IBO belt in a unification
fight with IBF ruler Jeff Lacy
(19-0) the following August in
Tampa, Florida.
In 2007 Reid was stopped by
future super-star Carl Froch
(21-0) in a British title fight,
and he generally had mixed
results before calling it a day
in late 2012 after another
British title-challenge (L TKO
5) against Kenny Anderson (17-1)
in Sheffield.
Robin Reid went undefeated as
World Boxing Federation World
Super Middleweight Champion,
making five successful defenses.
He fought some of the best of
his era and retired at age 41
with a fine professional record
of 42-8-1 (29).
As an interesting side-note, the
former world champion worked as
a judge in three WBF title
fights in 2014, doing a fine
job.
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