EDDIE HEARN CHRONICLES, PART IV
MY travelling schedule is brutal.
Yet I still love what I do. I have said multiple times that when I lose passion for what I do, for promoting, then Iโm out. It might happen in a year, it could be 10 years. I canโt put a time frame on it, at least not yet.
I still have that passion today, very much so. But things have changed. Thereโs more at stake. There is more pressure. So that might mean I donโt do this for much longer. The other possibility, and this is the more likely because Iโm a bit of a sick f**ker like that, it could make me even worse.
Honestly? I donโt want to do this forever. I want to spend more time with my kids. Youโre sacrificing so much of that family time and the only thing that fears me is living in regret. So, if I was to finish my career and go, โF**king hell, I wasnโt really around that much for the kidsโฆโ, I donโt want to do that.
My kids understand. Iโve been through what theyโve been through with my dad. I donโt hold any grudges to him โ but he wasnโt around. I had to travel with him just so I could see him. But it never affected me, not really. My kids are used to it now but that doesnโt mean I donโt think about it.
This is the worst business in the world. The world. You have to sleep with one eye open every night. People are trying f**k you. Fighters could be leaving. Broadcasters might be up to this and that.
But itโs an addiction, itโs a game you have to win. Itโs an addiction. Boxing is an addiction. Weโre all addicted to it and I often wonder what Iโll do with myself when I do manage to give it up.
My dad left boxing. He went to a happier place with no aggravation. The darts. But he had a heart attack at the age of 48. His dad died at the age of 45 and his dad died at the age of 44. So itโs looking good for me.
I am regularly tested. I run three times a week. I’m a big lump but I can run. I try to keep as fit as I can and I have to. There should be no excuse for me not to go running or go to the gym. Too busy? Then set your alarm an hour earlier. But then my alarm goes off at 5 or 6 and I’m knackered. Knackered.
But what scares me more than anything is what the business of boxing, especially the business of promoting, does to you. It makes you bitter. I look at the older promoters and they are bitter as f**k. And I donโt blame them one bit. I donโt think theyโre horrible people, itโs the game. Theyโve been f**ked so many times. Theyโve been cheated on so many times.
Iโm not there yet. I have always wished for peopleโs success. Unlike my rival promoters, I do not hope my rival promotersโ shows fail. But I worry that I will be like that if I stay in the sport too long.
I honestly think, one day, I will go โ done. Iโm out.
THIS WAS THE LAST IN A FOUR-PART SERIES
PART I: ‘I didn’t know what the f**k I was doing!’
PART II: ‘How I persuaded Sky Sports to make me their sole promoter’
PART III: ‘Suddenly everyone was booing me’