Laila Ali weighs in on boxing, father and empowering women

WASHINGTON — Her father was “The Greatest,” but Laila Ali says with the right mindset anyone can achieve their full potential.

Ali, daughter of boxing legend Muhammad Ali, defeated some of the most prominent names in women’s boxing, retiring with a 24-0 record. Now, she’s a mom, fitness expert and business founder and she is defining her wins in a whole new way.

“I do everything in my life with the mindset of a champion and I approach everything the same way as I approached boxing when I was a young girl, so that’s what’s been able to keep me successful,” Ali said on WTOP Friday.

Ali is in the D.C. are for the Get Radical Conference, a three-day conference aimed at women’s success in business and in their personal lives. She will speak at the conference about motivating women to “live like a champion.”

“You visualize what it is you want, you make it happen, you don’t wait for it to happen,” Ali said of her advice for women.

Ali says the same principals fueled her in her boxing career.

She says most people assumed she grew up in the gym and always wanted to box, but that is not the case. Ali saw a her first women’s boxing match when she was 17 and joined the sport after realizing it was her passion.

“I just trained to see if I had the talent that it would take to make it happen and I did and I just worked at it and surrounded myself with a great team of people who would teach me what it was I needed to know.”

Watch a video of Ali discuss the Get Radical Conference below:

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Sarah Beth Hensley

Sarah Beth Hensley is the Digital News Director at WTOP. She has worked several different roles since she began with WTOP in 2013 and has contributed to award-winning stories and coverage on the website.

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