Hajime No Ippo

Hajime no Ippo (はじめの一歩, lit. “The First Step”) is a Japanese boxing-themed manga series written and illustrated by George Morikawa. It has been serialized by Kodansha in the shōnen manga magazine Weekly Shōnen Magazine since October 1989, with its chapters collected into 139 tankōbon volumes as of November 2023. It follows the story of high school student Ippo Makunouchi, as he begins his career in boxing and over time obtains many titles and defeats various opponents.

Summary : Ippo Makunouchi is an extremely shy high school student, unable to make friends due to always being busy helping his mother run their family fishing charter business. Because he kept to himself, a group of bullies led by Umezawa got into the habit of picking on him. One day, when these bullies gave him a rather serious beating, a middleweight professional boxer who was passing by stopped them and took the injured Ippo to the Kamogawa Gym (鴨川ボクシングジム, Kamogawa Bokushingu Jimu), owned by retired boxer Genji Kamogawa, to treat his wounds. After Ippo awoke to the sounds of boxers training, the boxer who saved him, Mamoru Takamura, tried to cheer Ippo up by letting him vent his frustrations on a sandbag. It was then that they had their first glimpse into Ippo's talent for boxing.