King Of The Ring is the autobiography of seven time professional wrestling heavy weight champion, Harley Race. With over fifty years in the wrestling business, Harley Race has been around to see the colorful characters, and evolution of the sport that he was a master craftsman of. Clocking in at just a hair shy of 180 pages, King Of The Ring is a fast read. It starts with Harley breaking into pro wrestling at the age of fifteen. Being two-hundred and thrity solid lbs at his age, promoter could see potential written all over him. he got his start working Gus Karras doing shows for $10-12 in a traveling carnival. After a couple years doing that (and recovering from a major auto accident), Harley had enough experience to work for Verne Gagne's American Wrestling Aliance. Billed as "Handsome" Harley Race he teamed with Larry "The Axe" Hennig and won the tag titles a couple times. After working there, Harley went to work in Japan for Shoei Baba's All Japan wrestling organization. In the early 70's Harley had a short stint as the National Wrestling Alliance champion; a title he would go on to win 6 more times. The book doesn't get into the 80's until 100 pages in. It's here that he goes into the demise of the regional circuits of pro wrestling and how Vince McMahon's national WWF promotion came to prominence. This part is short and sweet as Harley talks about how he got the "King" moniker from McMahon and his battles inthe ring with Hulk Hogan. Aging, Harley also goes into his multiple abdominal surgeries and the being divorved at the age of 47. Overall, this is a great book for fans of the time where the National Wrestling Alliance ruled the wrestling landscape.
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The review of this Book prepared by Bobby Blades