British boxing champion Daniel Mendoza weighed only 160 pounds but defeated many bigger fighters with his speed and agility, which enabled him to throw a punch before his opponents could. Mendoza reigned through the 1790s, when the phrase beat to the punch became a common one in boxing circles. It wasn’t until about thirty years later, in 1823, that beat to the punch began to be used figuratively for “to do what someone else plans to do before he does it.” Possibly the first of the scientific” boxers. Mendoza operated a boxing school where he taught many British gentlemen how to fight. Among many innovative techniques he originated were infighting, the jab, the hook and the old one-two.