Jean-Pierre Coopman: Belgian Boxing Legend Who Faced Muhammad Ali

“Come down, we would like to chat with you,” Yasmin said on the phone beforehand. “Because it’s about time he was valued in Belgium. There is not a single boxer in our country who has achieved what he has done. Imagine: first against Ali and two years later European champion.”

Four high up in the small apartment on the Grote Markt in Beveren, Jean-Pierre watches from his window seat as his wife welcomes us. He and Yasmin – after quite a bit of wandering – finally ended up here. “I am from Waasland, I was born and raised here,” says Yasmin. “I am home again.” She wants to add something: “I actually want everyone to see that he is also a champion as a person. He has a good character. He’s a diamond, to me anyway. When we got married back then, he turned 60, they didn’t give us a year. In the meantime we have been married for 18 years.”

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Since that wedding day, they have not left each other’s side. “We are together all day, 24 hours a day,” says Yasmin. “I stopped working a few years ago. I was in the healthcare sector, with a doctor for 23 years and in a retirement home. with my health. Working was no longer possible then, and walking has also become very difficult. Plus: I started working when I was fourteen, it was enough, for sure.”

Health is good, they say. Except for that step. Jean-Pierre is also not well on his feet. Although he himself denies this in all tonalities. He still goes where he wants without any problems, he mutters, not ‘impeded’, as he describes it. “But still…”, says his wife. “It is difficult for him to walk, he cannot get a kilometer far. I have a walker in front of him, but he refuses. “You drive it,” he says to me. “I’ll hold on then.” That’s the boxer’s pride, isn’t it? Well, further than the bench here on the corner of the street, if the weather is good, we won’t go. Or we can have a drink on the Markt.”

“If I do go shopping around the corner, he writes it down in the agenda, I have to let him know in advance,” she continues. “While I’m gone, he’s waiting at the door for me to get back.” For the rest, the days come and go: “We are awake at six, half past six. Our coffee and Jean-Pierre already a first crème-glace. Or a Cornetto or three, or a whole box. He’s a sweetie, isn’t he? Then I start doing my chaste and he watches TV, always together.”

They became a couple too late to have children, but Jean-Pierre does have three from his first marriage. “Joël, Joseline and Eveline,” he says. “They live in the West Flanders. Joel is now 50 or it won’t matter much. Joseline and Eveline are in their 40s. We see Eveline regularly, the other two don’t. We hear them sometimes, but that’s all. They are children from another marriage, aren’t they?

We look back with Jean-Pierre to that special day, February 20, 1976. In Puerto Rico he stepped into the ring to box against Muhammad Ali, ‘The Greatest’. That in itself was surprising. Coopman was not an absolute world top: “I first had to beat the ten best heavyweights in Europe and I had to get to the top ten in the world.” Ali was, of course, a boxer beyond category. Coopman didn’t have much chance. “In my subconscious I knew I didn’t stand a chance, but I went there anyway with the idea: maybe I can do it after all.” But it was not a success: it was over in the fifth round.

Still, that camp changed his life: “Whenever I went somewhere, it was always directly about Ali.” Later there was no contact with the legendary champion. At least: that is what Jean-Pierre can initially picture. But then the memories come, with a bitter aftertaste: “You saw him, Jean-Pierre”, says Yasmin, “when he did that tour in our country and you were not invited by the Belgian Boxing Federation. Jean-Pierre could have bought a ticket and he was in the fourth row.”

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Coopman also gets going: “Right! Ali was introduced by a sports journalist. He talked to him about all kinds of things, and also asked about Coopman. Can you imagine that? While being interviewed, Ali turned to the room. At one point he saw me sitting there. He kept looking at me and then I raised my hand. He came running to me and shouted, ‘Cooperman! Cooperman!’ He called me into the ring, and you know what he did? He gave me two kisses.”

Coopman is silent for a moment and then says: “Why wasn’t I invited? That’s Belgium, isn’t it! Belgium and the Boxing Federation!” Yasmin chimes in: “He has had little recognition. I think hey. He has flooded the Sportpaleis five times. Completely sold out! He became European champion! Come on! Who is ever going to imitate him? Gene a few! They know him more abroad than here, the truth!’ (gets excited) He still gets letters from everywhere, even from America.”

Things were not going well for Jean-Pierre after his career. With the money he had earned from the camp with Ali – about 50,000 euros – he opened a café in Roeselare. “I had it managed by a very good friend who had three businesses of his own. Who could I trust more? But one day the bosses of the brewery showed up at my door. I was in I don’t know how deep in debt! The uppercut of my life. There was a put of 25,000 euros just from the purchase of beer. Hard is not it!” Jean-Pierre takes a drink and is silent. “Thank God that is now behind us,” says Yasmin. “And we stayed together despite everything.”

Sometimes Jean-Pierre still makes a painting, his great hobby from the past. “On order,” he says. “What people give me as a subject, I paint. But that doesn’t happen much anymore.” Yasmin tells another anecdote: “Jean-Pierre once made a painting of Ali, life size, almost two meters. At that time, the VRT ran the documentary ‘Geen Dag Zonder Ali’ (in the series ‘Belga Sport’, editor’s note). They had asked to make a painting. And they would have Jean-Pierre personally deliver that to Ali. Eventually they came to get it, they rolled it up and took it with them. No idea if Ali got that. Is not it awful.”

Did the match against Ali change his life? “Boxing has changed my life,” says Coopman firmly. “I have gone from a smoker and a drunkard to a man who no longer smokes or drinks.” The latter is not the truth, Yasmin winks: “His wines, he drinks them every day! But we have no problem with that.”

Life has been hard. It went the way it went. “What else do I want? Stay healthy as long as possible. I didn’t get any injuries from boxing,” says Coopman. “Instead of knocking my mind out, they knocked it in.” (laughs)

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“We are pleased”, concludes Yasmin. “And happy together. Ruben Van Gucht once asked Jean-Pierre in ‘De Zevende Dag’ what should be on his obituary card. He said, ‘I loved the animals, I loved the people. But mostly from my little Yasmien.’ He wrote that down, it’s in his wallet. That moves me.”

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