IT WAS a painful night, January 29, 1973, not least of all for the two men pictured here during the British lightweight championship bout.

Ken Buchanan and Jim Watt were the stars of the show at the Albany Hotel, with Buchanan winning on points and earning a Lonsdale Belt in the process.

For Evening Times writer John Quinn, however, the fight itself was a little overshadowed by what happened afterwards.

“I have conducted interviews in a wide variety if places, but none could ever match the setting in which I found myself early today … in a hotel lift stuck between floors and with 10 of us on board,” he wrote.

“I shared the bizarre and frightening experience with newly crowned British lightweight champion Ken Buchanan in the Albany Hotel, Bothwell Street, Glasgow….”

Glasgow Times:

The drama began after a bloody and bruising battle between the two men which is still talked about today.

Around 700 fans watched the bout and afterwards, a hotel lift carrying Ken, his father Tommy, some friends and John Quinn, got stuck.

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“It was funny at first as we shared a joke,” wrote Quinn, “but by the time the fire brigade arrived – minutes after we were released from our half-hour of torture – the mirth had worn paper-thin. Ken, tired after his exertions ... was in a state approaching collapse when we eventually left our ‘prison’ – at four minutes to one.”

Afterwards he told John: “That was an ordeal I could have done without. The fight was hard enough without that.”