Ippo Makunouchi

Ippo Makunouchi is the eponymous main protagonist from the Hajime no Ippo anime and manga.

Ippo is a semi-retired Featherweight Professional Boxer from the Kamogawa Boxing Gym and the former reigning JBC Featherweight Champion.

He originally started boxing to try and answer one simple question: "What does it mean to be strong?". Since then he has formed a rivalry with Miyata Ichirō, Sendō Takeshi, Mashiba Ryō, a brotherly bond with Takamura Mamoru, Aoki Masaru, Kimura Tatsuya, and a deep trust for his coach, Kamogawa Genji, whom he now aims to become a world champion for to honor the coach's teachings.

Appearance
Striking a resemblance to his father, he has black, shaggy hair and thick eyebrows. His body, while being in the featherweight division, is stressed as extremely muscular. In terms of skin tone, Ippo is tanned. His eye colour is dark brown in the manga, and a mix of green and yellow in the anime. It should be noted that Ippo has a larger than average penis, a quality apparently not uncommon amongst featherweights as Sendou has one as well, according to Takamura.

Later, Ippo shaved his hair as a way to take the guilt of having injured Taihei after he slapped him.

Personality
As a child, Ippo was a very shy, kind and obedient boy who was also very strong-willed and stubborn. He carries most of these personality traits as he got older. He is usually a kind and reserved person who dislikes fighting, and because of that he had been bullied since grade school. He would also come home after school, holding back his tears and try to convince his mother that everything was alright after being bullied.

Despite his strength and courage, Ippo still behaves rather meek out of the ring and often humbles himself around his rivals. For example, even though he has defeated both Mashiba and Sendou, he fears Mashiba and tries to avoid discussing a second rematch with Sendou whenever he is around. He also continued to be intimidated by Umezawa, his former bully, long after he began boxing. He has a great deal of respect for his gymmate Takamura and former Japanese Featherweight Champion Date and he was completely shocked when World Featherweight Champion Ricardo requested a spar with him.

His dream is to one day face Miyata in the pro ring, and the two of them view each other as eternal rivals. They both also influence each other to keep on boxing. Despite these feelings towards each other, they appear to also view each other as friends and Ippo even refers to Miyata as "Miyata-kun". Because Ippo tends to know a lot about Miyata, people tend to call him a Miyata Otaku, while his gym mates jokingly imply that he must be "gay forMiyata". Miyata is a person Ippo will never forget. At the same time, Ippo aims to become equal to Takamura in terms of strength.

Kamogawa puts him through strict training and the two of them have a strong teacher-student bond. Ippo trusts Kamogawa and has faith in his teachings, while Kamogawa believes that Ippo may be the one who will eventually realise his World Championship dream. Takamura has said that Kamogawa seems more like Ippo's father than his coach, and because Ippo's father died when he was young he begins to view Kamogawa in that way. When Ippo decided to be a second, he wanted to raise boxers alongside Kamogawa, as he believed he left a bad taste in his mouth when he retired.

Ippo can also be fixated on a certain thing, specifically the Diagonal Dempsey Roll, being so single-minded that he gets overheated, frustrated and loses his boxing style.

Ippo is quite friendly, and many of his rivals have become friends of his, most notably are Miyata, Sendou, Date, Sanada, Volg, and Kobashi, whom all still keep in touch with him from time to time. He is well liked by his gymmates, especially Takamura, Aoki, and Kimura. Even though he still has the personality of a young boy, he still manages to serve as a good senpai for his kouhai Itagaki.

When it comes to love, Ippo is definitely a late bloomer, he is naive, pure-hearted, and awkward. He is in love with Kumi whom he dates frequently, and she feels the same for him, but because of the silent pressure of Kumi's older brother Ryou, the "attacks" of reporter Iimura and Nanako, and the meddling of Takamura and the others, their relationship has yet to progress much. The one time Ippo confessed to her, Kumi had fallen asleep after drinking too much alcohol, and unfortunately didn't hear it.

Because of his personality, Ippo is seldom seen as being angry before a fight, even if his opponent insults him or his boxing skills. However, it has been shown on rare occasions that he is capable of displaying anger whenever an opponent says or hurts someone close to him, or does something to look down on the sport of boxing, which he loves. Such occasions have been when he saw Sawamura intentionally commit fouls in his previous matches, despite having the upperhand, and then later on when he struck Kumi with a sharp jab, cutting her face. Another occasion when his opponent, Kojima, insulted his previous opponents, both in person and publicly in a magazine, and also insulting Kamogawa's teaching methods as they were fault. This resulted in Ippo displaying a new attitude, even going so far as to calmly state to Takamura, when asked if he would have any problems, that "this won't take long", referring to the match. Ippo's anger side also shows when he sees someone getting bullied, confronting the bullies.

Abilities
"Main Article: Makunouchi Ippo/Boxing Abilities"As an In Fighter, having one of the best punches in Japan, he has any noteworthy milestones such as fighting in the All Japan Rookie King Tournament, winning in the A Class Boxer Tournament, and once crowned as the Featherweight JBC champion with an impressive KO rate of 100%. His punching power, durability, and fighting spirit are considered to be his greatest attributes; each is unparalleled in Japan. His punching power in particular is said to be among the world's best, with the implication that Ippo's punches are comparable to World Champion Ricardo Martinez. His style has had vast improvements throughout the series, and now consist of sways, liver blows, and a Sunday Punch: the Dempsey Roll. His strong flurry of blows have earned him the title Wind God. He is the number one In-Fighter in Japan.

Trivia

 * His given name Ippo means "one step", creating a pun in the series' title (as Hajime means "first", therefore "The First Step").
 * Ippo's boxing style is modelled with Mike Tyson and Ray Mancini combined.
 * Ippo has trouble dealing with boxers such as Alexis Argüello.
 * His Dempsey Roll is named after the technique used by world champion Jack Dempsey.
 * Ippo birthday, November 23rd, is notably on Labour Thanksgiving Day in Japan.
 * Ippo's blood type is O.
 * The fights Ippo will never forget are, his fight against Date, Gonzales, and Antonio.
 * His favourite boxer is Takamura.
 * His favourite punch is the right cross.
 * His favourite place to fight is Kourakuen Hall.
 * All fighters leave a strong impression.
 * Miyata is a person he'll never forget.
 * Ippo's favourite real-life boxer is Mike Tyson.
 * Ippo is a terrible driver, though he can steer a boat just fine. He's also awful at baseball and editing manga, and has never been shown catching a fish, though he has been shown fishing numerous times.
 * In Chapter 1158, it's revealed that Ippo is an expert at bowling. The Kamogawa crew believe this is because "bowling" and "boxing" are just a few letters apart.
 * There was an real-life simulated fight between Ippo and the main character from Ashita no Joe, Ippo won in the fifth round by knockout with a Liver Blow.
 * Though he is a 126 lb. featherweight, Ippo once knocked out someone from two weight classes higher than him with a single punch (making him flip backward through the air, no less), and can give Takamura, then a middleweight, trouble in an arm wrestling match.
 * As of volume 99, Ippo can catch an estimated 23 leaves with both hands, with at least 11 being caught with his left. He can also carry 8 boxes full of fish.
 * He hadn't received a single down since his fight with Sanada Kazuki, until his fight against Alfredo Gonzales. (A total of 10 matches in a row.)
 * The first two opponents Ippo has lost to (Date Eiji and Alfredo Gonzales), have been defeated both by Ricardo Martinez twice.
 * They also have both already faced Ricardo Martinez in the past, and after Date's victory against Ippo, he once again faced Ricardo.