Not every athlete gets to walk away the way they imagined when they started down a professional path. David Lemieux is not the first, and sadly won’t be the last to call it a career on a tragic note. David Lemieux walks away from the sport he loved after his father was innocently gunned down waiting for a bus.
The 33-year old said:
“I’ve accomplished a lot in the course of my career. I achieved my dream of becoming a world champion, I’ve given the fans rousing fights by accepting every challenge that came my way. I devoted my life to training, to boxing, and now I want to cherish every minute with my family. To learn that your father died by being shot waiting for the bus is quite a shock. Everyone in the family is still shaken”.
And for that you can’t blame him. You must actually tip your cap to him. In a sport with a growing population of trash-talk and anger issues, the Canadian is a throw back to an age gone by in the “sweet science”.
He picked up titles as a junior middleweight, middleweight, and super middleweight. But the thought of carrying on without his one true mentor was just too much to bare. His father was one of three people shot to death in a shooting spree in Montreal earlier this month. Andre Ferdinand Lemieux was just 64-years old and his killer was later killed by police, which was first confirmed by the newspaper The Sun.
David Lemieux Walks Away With A Solid Legacy
Was “The Demolisher” the best at any one thing during his best run of his career; which was at the start? He began 25-0 with 24-knockouts. And finishes at 43-5 with 36-knockouts. Well, he hit hard, real hard and did so with precision, although it wasn’t the best in the game, nor was his movement. . It did get him to the big stage however. Those 36-knockouts and 200-plus rounds of action were always about heart and determination. Even when he got the short end of the stick, his fights were cerebral chess matches. To some there were times when he looked uninterested in exchanging. But then he’d just “flip a switch”, even in the middle of a round.
His signature win might just be his tenth-round finish of Gabriel Rosado. In the Barclay’s Center he retained both the WBC and NABF middleweight straps in 2014.
In a 12-round tug-of-war decision he dropped Hassan N’Dam four-times. That made his hometown crowd rejoice as he ripped the body and finished with hooks to the head. And an underrated victory of his was when he came in with a purpose and got Gary O Sullivan out of there inside the opening round. That was win number-40. “Spike” had trash-talked in the lead up about Lemieux not being focused and having a growing list of holes in his game.
His losses were just as defining, and came to some of the best. The unanimous decision loss to Billy Joe Saunders is one he always wanted back. As well as his TKO loss to Gennady Golovkin. Even though in his toughest fight he was beaten solidly as “GGG” picked him apart. And in what’s turned out to be his final fight, despite his heart not to go down; he was shredded by David Benavidez.
The Final Chapter…
Some boxers walk away to only come back after changing their minds. This case probably won’t be one of them. He walks away with his head held high and no regrets. But it’s a guarantee that if you ask him what fight did he never get that he wanted, the answer will be Canelo Alvarez.
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