FIG. 14. Workers busy with preparations on August 12, 1974, at main entrance of 20 Mai Stadium. President Mobutu invested millions in refurbishing the stadium, the highways, phone lines, and a satellite receiving station in his bid to put Zaire and his regime on the map. (AP Photo).

FIG. 15. At the dedication of the refurbished stadium, Mobutu raises the arms of Foreman, left, and Ali, right on September 22, 1974. Note the bandage over Foreman’s eye, which was cut in training and required postponing the fight five weeks. Mobutu wanted the fight to cap the two-week celebration of his authenticity campaign. (AP Photo/ Horst Faas).

FIG. 16. Singer and bandleader James Brown in concert February 12, 1974. Brown and his band were the headliners of Zaire 74, the 3-day music festival to accompany the fight. The festival featured an unprecedented international cast of musicians across the African diaspora. Foreman’s cut delayed the bout and killed any chance of a profit. (AP/Photo).

FIG. 17. Foreman and promoter Don King in traditional African dress. During the delay King became the face of the promotion. Foreman’s German Shepherd Digo accompanied him everywhere in Zaire, reminding the Zarois of dog’s role as a vicious tool of the Belgian Colonial Regime, making it easy for Ali to depict the champion as a Belgian oppressor and himself as their liberator. (AP Photo/Horst Faas).

FIG. 18. While Foreman and Digo stood apart from the Zarois, Ali cultivated them as soon as he deplaned in Kinshasa, September 10, 1974. Here he is seen kissing a Zarois child. Children flocked to Ali whenever he appeared in public. The woman is Ali’s second wife, Belinda. (AP Photo/Horst Faas).

FIG. 19. Ali cultivated the Zarois during his training sessions at N’Sele, where he recited poetry and harangued Foreman as a Belgian oppressor. Ali enjoyed entertaining his fans. Here he mimicks exhaustion after sparring, mocking predictions that he was too old to win. His cornerman “Bundini” is at left and his long-time trainer Angelo Dundee is at right. Man, center, unidentified. October 1974 (AP Photo).

FIG. 20. At the weigh-in on October 26 in 20 Mai Stadium, a healed and confident champion responds to cheers of the crowd, finally steals some of Ali’s thunder, and impresses the world with his awesome muscles. Could Ali beat such a goliath? At left, Foreman’s manager Dick Sadler, in hat, talks with Don King, identified by his electric hair. Right, in white hat is Archie Moore, Foreman’s trainer and former light heavyweight champion. Next to Foreman is Job Corps trainer Doc Broadus. (AP Photo).

FIG. 21. Foreman, left, has Ali on the ropes in the first round. As Ali retreated to the ropes in what became known as his rope-a-dope strategy, it appeared that the champion was too powerful for the aging challenger, on October 30, 1974. (AP Photo).

FIG. 22. Ali watches Foreman pirouette to the canvas in the 8th round. This was the first time Foreman had been knocked down, let alone knocked out. The loss of his title in such a humiliating upset threw the former champion into a depression. Given little chance to win, Ali proved his greatness. The victory vindicated him and a generation of black and white radicals who identified with his defiance of the American Government, the U. S. Military, and a racist white America. At right, open-mouthed are George Plimpton and Norman Mailer dumbfounded by the KO. (AP Photo).

FIG. 23. Newly-crowned heavyweight champion Muhammad Ali meets with President Gerald Ford at The White House, December 10, 1974. In 1967 Ali, the most conspicuous draft resister of the Vietnam War, was now accepted by many politicians and government officials who had previously scorned him. At left is Ali’s brother, Rahman Ali. (AP Photo).

FIG. 24. Spray flies from head of challenger Joe Frazier as champion Muhammad Ali connects with a right in the 9th round of “The Thrilla in Manila,” October 1, 1975. Ali won on a 14th round TKO. The third Ali-Frazier bout was consumed by the personal animosity between the two men and Ali’s brazen extramarital affairs. (AP Photo/Mitsunori Chigita).

FIG. 25. Heavyweight champion Ali and his bride, Veronica Porche, June 19, 1977, following their wedding in Los Angeles. It was Ali’s third marriage. His relationship with Porche went back to Zaire and along with his endless womanizing contributed to the end of his marriage to Belinda Boyd (Khalila). (AP Photo/stf).

FIG. 26. After losing to Jimmy Young in Puerto Rico in 1977, Foreman was born again, quit boxing, and became an evangelical preacher in Houston, where he started his own church and his George Foreman Youth Center. Here he holds his Bible during a prayer meeting July 9, 1981. (AP Photo/Ed Kolenovsky).

FIG. 27. In one of the sport’s greatest reversals, ten years after leaving boxing, Foreman returned to the ring. On November 5, 1994, he reclaimed the title by knocking out Michael Moorer in the 10th round in Las Vegas. The paunchy, 45 year-old, became the oldest man to win the heavyweight crown. (AP Photo/ Lennox Mclendon).

FIG. 28. Former heavyweight champion George Foreman poses during a promotional event for his Lean-Mean-Grilling Machine in Tokyo, April 10, 2007. Starting in the ‘90s, Foreman’s personality transformation brought on by his religious conversion from sullen black man to smiling, self-deprecating everyman made him an excellent, race-neutral crossover pitchman for products as diverse as Meineke Mufflers, McDonalds, KFC and The Grill. (AP Photo/Kin Cheung).

FIG. 29. Diagnosed in 1984 with a form of Parkinson’s, Ali’s image dimmed. Engineered in part by his 4th wife, Lonnie, Ali was invited to light the cauldron at the opening of the Atlanta Olympics July 19, 1996. With shaky hands, shuffling feet, and subdued voice the ex-champ was no longer the agile fighter of his youth or the outspoken critic of racist America. He became a symbol of persistence against adversity and physical disability. Soon his endorsements increased. (AP Photo/Doug Mills)

FIG. 30. Together again. George Foreman looks on as Will Smith hugs Ali after the two former champions appeared on stage after When We Were Kings (1996) was awarded Best Documentary Film, March 24, 1997. (AP Photo/Susan Sterner).