Lewis must beat boredom

'I can't put my feet in Lennox Lewis's shoes. Maybe he'll find something to occupy himself. They've been saying he may be getting married and trying to have kids. That might occupy him. But that was my greatest fear when I retired - boredom.' It was a fear that was to haunt Bruno from August 1996, when a serious eye injury forced him to quit the sport, until last September when he was sectioned under the Mental Health Act.

Not every passing moment had been spent watching the clock. Bruno enjoyed his annual starring role in pantomime and there were celebrity appearances in public or in commercials on television.

But away from the spotlight Bruno found time on his hands, particularly following a difficult divorce from Laura, the mother of his three children.

With nothing else to do he would train obsessively in the ring erected in the garden of his Essex mansion, then he would dwell on increasingly negative thoughts.

Following his release from hospital Bruno would recall those troubled hours alone in a big, empty house.

'Suddenly I didn't know who I was any more. I'd been Frank Bruno, boxer. Now I was Frank Bruno - what? I no longer had my boxing or my family. I was lonely. It was confusing and scary.'

These days confusion has given way to some semblance of order. When we met this week, at the grand opening of a new gym in Leyton, the 42-year-old looked fitter than any of the sweating bodies pounding on the treadmills.

Maybe those big eyes are not yet lit on full beam, but they're bright enough to recognise the affection young and old still have for him.

Making public appearances for the Fitness First chain of health clubs is one lucrative way in which Bruno fends off boredom. Last week they flocked to see him at a branch in Bradford. Next week he's in Kidderminster.

On this particular night in east London, junior members of a karate team gazed in awe at the genial giant as he signed everything put in front of him: T-shirts, photographs and even sheets of paper ripped from this writer's notepad.

How different it had been on Bruno's final descent into manic depression when he admitted he couldn't bear anything that felt like an unexpected demand. Such as that for an autograph.

Helped by on-going counselling, Bruno has now regained some perspective on life in general and on his life in particular. 'It's nice and important to meet people,' he said. 'Youngsters coming up, old people, people my age. Very, very nice and very important.

'It's a sweet buzz. I really mustn't grumble.'

There are other appointments in the diary - Bruno is committed to helping mental health charities; next month he is being honoured with a luncheon at the Dorchester Hotel, where verbal sparring partner Harry Carpenter will sit alongside him at the top table; and he wants to resume his relationship with boxing, watching ringside and helping young amateurs.

'I still train,' he said, though admitting the much-vaunted comeback against Audley Harrison will not now happen. 'I look after myself. I've got a house to look after. I've got my kids to look after.

'I do bits and pieces here and there. I'm like a retired old man in his slippers shuffling along nicely, not too fast and not too slow. Just smooth.'