On the 61st anniversary of Happy Lora, a review of the year he was crowned world boxing champion

“This is the opportunity of a lifetime” Miguel 'Happy' Lora told El Tiempo on August 9, 1985 in the exciting pre-fight that consecrated him as world bantamweight champion of the World Boxing Council -WBC- against Mexican Daniel Zaragoza. He was not the favorite, except in his native Monteria, which in those days was much mentioned thanks to the 24-year-old pugilist at the time.

This April 12, the boxer turns 61, and what better way to celebrate his birth than by evoking one of the most important moments in Colombian sports history that occurred at a time that, until then, he had no reason to celebrate in this area; in fact, the closest thing to trying a victory was precisely in the quadrilateral on behalf of Bernardo Caraballo, on July 4, 1967, when for the second time he played the bantamweight title against Japanese Masaiko Harada.

However, years after the fight that Cartagena himself considered to be “one of the most disgusting robberies in the history of sports”, Colombia would enter the ring Olympus thanks to the title of Antonio Cervantes 'Kid Pambelé', Rodrigo Rocky Valdez and the brothers Ricardo and Prudencio Cardona.

With that background, Lora arrived in Miami with an enviable record: until that day he had played 22 fights, all won and 12 of them through the knockout; but nevertheless and that he was not the favorite in the title, starting with the Mexican being the defending champion, and days before the match, he himself had stated that the Colombian “lacked something”, and it was true: Lora was only 1.63, which represented a disadvantage compared to 1.67 for the Central American.

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He was local in the United States, but Zaragoza did not estimate that the fights were lived before the first bell; because although both were left-handed, the training that the Monteria-born had was so intense that he lost by unanimous decision.

After that triumph over Daniel Zaragoza, Lora enlivened her triumphant entries with the music of the American Goldfinch, a cabal she didn't let go until the day she lost her reign, three years later.

Was the fight easy? No, the predictions were the winner of the Mexican, but the Colombian's poise was superior and he sent his opponent twice to the canvas between the fourth and fifth round. The rumors of knockout were strong both at the coliseum in Miami and in Colombia, but Zaragoza stood up until the last round.

The cards, given by judges Tony Gastellano, Miguel Donate and Lou Filipo scored 116-109, 118-107 and 115—110 respectively, giving the triumph to the monterian who made an entire country 'happy'.

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Later, Miguel Lora defended this title seven times, thus extending his legend: Wilfredo Vásquez, Enrique Sánchez, Alberto Davila, Antonio Avelar, Ray Minus, Lucio 'Submachine' López and Alberto Dávila could not fight the Colombian who, in those last two fights, was accompanied by the accordion and the portentous voice of Jorge Oñate, friendship that began in 1986.

The monterian's stay at the top of the CMB lasted until 1988, when Mexican Raul Jíbaro Lopez snatched the title from him at the Hilton Hotel in Las Vegas, Nevada. There, the latter won by unanimous decision. The Colombian's shaky defense was not enough to counter his rival's punching. He won the title against a Mexican and lost it to someone from that country, another fact that adds to the compendium of data belonging to the Colombian boxing legend.

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