Ayub Kalule

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Ayub Kalule (born January 6, 1954) is a retired boxer from Uganda, who first came to prominence when he won the Amateur World Welterweight Title at the inaugural 1974 World Championships in Havana, Cuba. He turned professional and based himself in Denmark, and went on to win the light-middleweight championship. He subsequently lost the title to Sugar Ray Leonard.

Born in Kampala, he began his professional boxing career in 1976 when he won a four round decision over Kurt Hombach in Copenhagen, Denmark. Kalule would be based out of Denmark for the rest of his career. He then won 29 more victories, achieving 30 wins, 0 losses. Included in those victories were defeats of Alipata Korovou for the Commonwealth Middleweight Title and a 10 round decision of former US Gold Medalist Sugar Ray Seales.

On October 24, 1979, Kalule traveled to Akita, Japan to take on Masashi Kudo for the WBA Junior middleweight Championship of the world. Kulule easily outboxed the champion and thus captured the coveted world champion belt. He then successfully defended the title four times before taking on the legendary Sugar Ray Leonard on June 25 1981 in the Houston Astrodome. A virtual unknown in the United States, Kalule was considered little more then a courier waiting to deliver the belt to Leonard. The fight proved much more difficult for Leonard as Kalule repeately landed straight lefts and fought on an almost even ground for the first five or six rounds. Slowly Leonard started to take control and in the 9th round ended the fight and Kalule's reign as WBA Champion.

Kalule fought on until the beginning of 1986 and managed to win the European Middleweight Title and defend it successfully against future world champion Sumbu Kalambay. Prior to that, he received another shot at the WBA Jr Middleweight Title held at that time by Davey Moore. Kalule put up a very good fight, but again was KO'd, this time in the 10th round. Ayub's career ended on February 5 1986 when he lost the European Middleweight Title to Herol Graham. He finished his career with a very impressive record of 46-4 with 24 KOs.

Ayub was a tremendously slick southpaw boxer who had enough sting in his punches to keep any opponent honest. While never really achieving crossover fame in the United States, he is regarded by many boxing insiders as one the finest pure boxers to ever come out of Africa.