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I was told as a teenager I'd never box again. I had a really bad wrist injury; I couldn't even shadow box for six months. I went through surgery just to try and manage it.
You think that after becoming world champion, you're going to be a massive superstar with lots of lucrative bouts against great fighters, but that never materialised for me.
I swore to myself that I was never going to lose again, and that's what drives me still. More than money, more than titles, more than fame, it's the desire not to be defeated.
I'm somebody from a little tiny town, who had boxed in leisure centres, and my last fight was in Madison Square Garden against one of the greats. What a great way to finish off.
It's not my place to say how good I was because the thing is, every champion from every era is a great fighter and it's up to one person's interpretation to who is actually the best.
I've been eight years with this beautiful little thing and I've got a partner for him now. After eight years of trying to unify the titles, it's going to be pretty hard to give this up.
When it comes to the singing part, I think I missed the boat - the whole family can sing except for me. But they can't fight, so I suppose I've been a bit more successful than them there.
When you know yourself that you've come through preparation injury free and you've done everything, you've done the work in the gym and the rounds of sparring, it fills you with confidence.
It's unbelievable when I think back to when I was a kid that one day I would have achieved so much through boxing, and to think my teachers laughed at me when I said I was going to be a boxer.
I'm not going to lie: you do get down sometimes, but I wouldn't say I was ever depressed; that's too hard a word. But you do become bored, because all you've done in your life is fight and box.
I definitely was a big puncher early on in my career, and I used to load up with my left hand. Then, towards the end of my career, I had hand problems and needed injections in my hands for the pain.
I like to give my kids the life I didn't have - they go to an excellent school; they have nice clothes, money for shopping. I'm quite generous with them, but they have fantastic manners - they're not spoilt.
I'm pretty excited: to be inducted into the Hall of Fame is a massive achievement... and to be inducted with Oscar de la Hoya and Felix Trinidad, two great fighters, is a massive honour for me and my family.
I feel blessed that I managed to fight 46 fights undefeated, that I was a world champion for 11 years, one of the longest reigning champions of all time and I like to think that I come out looking pretty good.
He's gonna try and stand back, mess me about a bit, be cagey and hold on the inside and make it one of them fights that are boring. I don't wanna make a boring fight. I don't like to be involved in boring fights!
Two big punchers, you've got to keep your chin down, keep your defense up, don't be careless or open, box sensibly, control the centre of the ring and when he lets his punches go, believe me he's gonna know all about it.
My career has been very difficult. People respect the fact that I haven't just turned professional like Amir Khan or Audley Harrison, and it's been, 'Here's a million pound' - for spoilt brats to fight a couple of fights.
[Tyson] Fury is big and [Wladimir] Klitschko's not used to fighting someone his size. If Fury can stop Klitschko grabbing and avoid that big right hand, he's got a chance. In the heavyweight division, it only takes one punch.
Beating Chris Eubank in 1997 was a great win and the toughest fight of my life, and beating Jeff Lacy was great, too. But Mikkel Kessler topped it, winning all the belts and fighting in front of all those fans in my home town.
We had nothing, no money, when I was young. We lived in a council house. My dad struggled; my mum struggled. But that made me what I am. If I had everything on a plate from the start, maybe I would not have been a champion for 11 years.
I think we have a normal father-and-son relationship. But like any other relationship, we have our differences. But we always seem to work out our differences. Believe it or not, our personalities are similar. We're both fiery and passionate.
Why am I not a household name in Britain? Why have I not got the recognition I deserve after so long? I think the fact that none of my fights are seen on terrestrial television is significant but, other than that, I don't exactly know. I really don't.
At the end of your career, you go, 'I'm gonna be able to retire undefeated and be one of the very, very few people in history to do it.' People were saying I should try and get to 50-0, but my number was 46 - that was it. I could have kept trying, but one loss would have spoiled everything.
It's not just a trainer - as a man, my dad was unbelievable. Even outside boxing, he was my friend as well. We were boxer and trainer in the gym, but as soon as that bell goes, we'd have a cup of tea, and we'd go on about normal life. We would just leave that bit behind. That's how we kept going.
I can't understand it myself - how nervous I was when I took the floor for 'Strictly Come Dancing.' I walk out with 50,000 people gathered in the Millennium Stadium to fight Mikkel Kessler in the unification fight for the super middleweight division in 2007, and I feel great... and here I am, wearing tight pants and Cuban heels, and freaking out.