On February 18 1964, Cassius Clay met The Beatles. The heavyweight challenger was at his training camp on Miami Beach, Florida. Ringo Starr, John Lennon, George Harrison and Paul McCartney put up one helluva fight. Well, they never did want to meet Clay all that badly. He was, as John Lennon put it, “that bigmouth who’s going to lose.”
The Beatles were huge news, chased from London by screaming fans all the way to the Ed Sullivan show and sensational sell-out shows.
Meeting them in Miami’s 5th St. Gym, was the Louiseville Lip, 22-year-old Cassius Clay, who had a year earlier beaten Londoner Henry Cooper in a bloody contest.
A week after the Beatles called round, Clay, the 7-1 outsider, beat Sonny Liston. He would go on to even greater things as Muhammad Ali.
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