‘I gave everything to boxing and still have nothing’

With her left eye swollen shut and blood pouring from her forehead, Heather Hardy tells the ringside doctor that she wants to continue.

She strides back to the centre of the ring, beats her chest and shouts “I don’t care, I don’t care.”

A near 20,000-strong crowd at American Airlines Center in Texas rises to its feet and lets out a huge roar of appreciation in admiration for a true warrior.

It is gladiatorial – it is all Hardy knows.

Hardy, 42, has never been a quitter and is not going to change the habit of a lifetime in the final minutes of her bout against undisputed featherweight champion Amanda Serrano.

They meet in the middle, touch gloves and the frantic action resumes – throwing heavy shots for the last 15 seconds of the penultimate round – before Hardy returns to her corner and once again hits her chest while soaking up the atmosphere.

One final round of all-out action follows until the bell rings and the two fighters share an embrace.

The blood is still being wiped from Hardy’s face as ring announcer Jimmy Lennon Jr prepares to confirm the result.

Serrano wins by a sweeping unanimous decision. There is no shock, surprise or protest from Hardy.

Serrano landed almost twice as many blows, and it goes down as another trademark gutsy performance from Brooklyn-born Hardy.

That contest on 5 August 2023 would ultimately prove to be Hardy’s final trip to the ring in a competitive capacity.

“I came out of the ring, got home and I had double vision,” Hardy tells BBC Sport.

“I also had regular concussion stuff, normal fighter stuff but the next day the double vision didn’t go away and I was kind of walking into stuff and I didn’t feel right.

“Long story short, it didn’t get any better, but I just got used to it. It’s like anything else if you break something or bruise something you just train through it.”

A year on from that defeat, rather than enjoying the fruits of a long career, Hardy is instead grappling with her utility company, Con Edison, on the phone.

“My lights are getting ready to get shut off. I bet you [two-time welterweight champion] Shawn Porter doesn’t have that problem,” Hardy says.

Hardy and Porter are both former world champions and appeared on the same card in 2016 at Barclays Center in Brooklyn but that is where the comparisons end.

Financially they are worlds apart.“I had this beautiful career but it’s like they just pushed me back outside the fence and said ‘just be happy you had the chance Heather, it was nice but go figure it out yourself’, ” Hardy says