Haddonfield Native Earns Praise For Biography Of Hector Camacho

HADDONFIELD, NJ — A Haddonfield native is earning critical acclaim for yet another portrait of a famous Latino champion boxer. This time, Christian Giudice is being praised for his portrait of Hector “Macho” Camacho.

“Macho Time: The Meteoric Rise and Tragic Fall of Hector Camacho,” is the first full-length biography of the legendary boxer. It came out last week, and is available via Kindle and in hardcover and paperback.

“Giudice writes with sensitivity about Camacho’s lifelong struggle with drugs and excessive partying that robbed him of a chance at true greatness,” the Library Journal writes in its review of the book. “Boxing fans who remember the ascendant days of lighter-weight fighters such as Roberto Durán, Sugar Ray Leonard, Julio César Chávez, and Oscar De La Hoya will want to read.”

Giudice describes the legend who electrified the boxing world of the 1980s as "handsome, outspoken and larger than life."

"With a passion for joyrides (one of which landed him in Rikers as a teen), the moves of Bruce Lee, a love of leopard print and gold, an unshakeable Nuyorican pride, and a complete indifference for what other people thought about him, Camacho may have seemed like an unlikely champion," Giudice said. "But time and again, he would prove his doubters—and there were plenty of them—wrong."

Giudice previously wrote about Durán in "Hands of Stone," which was adapted into a movie starring Edgar Ramirez and Robert DeNiro. He also wrote “Beloved Warrior: The Rise and Fall of Alexis Arguello;” and “A Fire Burns Within: The Miraculous Journey of Wilfredo Gomez.” Read more here: Haddonfield Native Who Penned “Hands of Stone” Ready For Release Of New Book

In his latest offering, Giudice chronicles Camacho’s life from his childhood in Puerto Rico (which his mother had to flee), to his coming of age in Spanish Harlem, to his training in various hardscrabble gyms throughout New York City, to his place atop the world stage of his chosen sport (which was, of course, the toughest sport), to the nightclub parking lot in San Juan where he was shot dead at the age of fifty in a drug deal gone bad.

He tells Camacho’s story through interviews with friends, family members, and fellow fighters—including Sugar Ray Leonard. Most notable is the access Giudice had to Hector Camacho, Jr., who was born when his father was just 16; the two basically grew up together. The result is a full portrait of a complex man who fought his inner demons with as much fury as he fought his competitors in the ring.

“Nothing that Camacho had been exposed to before could have prepared him for this moment,” Giudice writes in the first chapter. “Fans clamored to touch him as he made his ring walk. His handlers crowded around him to shield him from the onslaught of well-wishers. Years later, Camacho’s ring entrances would feel like vaudeville, all pomp and no substance, but now, as he headed to the ring, he was merely a young, charismatic fighter who possessed otherworldly skills.”

“The bullets that eventually found Hector Camacho had shadowed him throughout his tempestuous life,” Mike Stanton, author of Unbeaten: Rocky Marciano’s Fight for Perfection in a Crooked World, said in his review. “In this penetrating biography, Christian Giudice reveals the showman, the artist, the clown and the assassin ― the erratic family man and the pride of Spanish Harlem. The Macho Man was a blazing comet streaking across the sky, bringing brilliance and destruction, then disappearing all too soon.”

Giudice grew up in Haddonfield. He graduated from Villanova University in 1997, and earned a Master’s Degree in Journalism from Temple University.

He has written for the Gloucester County Times, the Ann Arbor News, Boxing Digest, The Jerusalem Post, Clemson Alumni Magazine, South Jersey Magazine, Notifight.com, Sports Illustrated, and various boxing websites.

Giudice is now an English teacher at Harper Middle College High School in Charlotte, North Carolina, where he lives with his wife and two children.