Muhammad Ali three-time world heavyweight champion

Muhammad Ali, the three-time world heavyweight champion who became a global and cultural icon, died on Friday in Phoenix. He was 74.
In boxing, Ali was known for his speed and punishing punches — skills that gave way to his signature catchphrase, “float like a butterfly, sting like a bee” — as well as his audacious self-promotion.

He lost the heavyweight championship to Leon Spinks in February 1978, regained it once more, then dropped his final bout in 1981. When Ali finally retired from boxing at the age of 39, he finished as a three-time heavyweight champion, with a record of 56-5.
Three years into retirement, Ali revealed he’d been diagnosed with Parkinson’s. His voice softened and his hands began to shake. He survived numerous hospital stays before his death Friday. Despite the disease, he remained active in old age, acting as
an advocate for Parkinson’s awareness and research.

In 1990, Ali helped win the release of 14 U.S. hostages from Saddam Hussein. Six years later, Ali stepped into the sports world spotlight once more, lighting the Olympic flame at the Summer Games in Atlanta. In 2005, President George W. Bush awarded him the Medal of Freedom.

Ali was married four times and is survived by his wife Yolanda “Lonnie” Ali and his nine children. His youngest daughter, Laila Ali, also became a professional boxer. (She retired in 2007, undefeated.)
Even as he grew older, Ali remained a larger-than-life figure, the subject of movies, documentaries, Gatorade commercials and posters. He was named Sports Illustrated’s “Sportsman of the Century” and graced the magazine’s cover 37 times — second only to Michael Jordan. Each time he appeared in public — at the University of Louisville for sporting events, for example — it was a spectacle.