Ali-Holmes and The Trail of Blood, Part 2

By Bill Ross

Read Part 1 By Clicking Here

THE MAYO CLINIC REPORT

After regaining the title from George Foreman in October 1974, the quality of Ali’s performances gradually diminished, even more so after his life and death struggle with Joe Frazier in 1975.  After these career-defining performances Ali really had nothing left to prove in the ring.

While Ali’s decline as a fighter was largely attributed to his increasing age, a less than dedicated approach to training as well as a hedonistic and undisciplined lifestyle also contributed to poor often disinterested performances.  By 1976 Ali had defeated all comers and had no new challenges left.  When Ali won a narrow, disputed decision over Ken Norton at Yankee Stadium the writing was on the wall.  Ali’s days, like all 34-year-old fighters, were clearly numbered.

On September 1977 Ali, as was now becoming his custom, won a close decision over Earnie Shavers in Madison Square Garden.  Afterwards, the promoter of the fight, Garden matchmaker Teddy Brenner privately asked Ali to announce his retirement.  Brenner had noticed some slight slurring of Ali’s speech and was concerned for the fighter who he considered a friend.  Brenner further demonstrated his concern for Ali’s welfare by holding a press conference and announcing Madison Square Garden would never promote another Ali fight while he was still matchmaker.

If Brenner’s actions were not a bold enough statement, longtime Ali physician Ferdie Pacheco’s were.  After the Shavers bout Pacheco had examined Ali’s medical reports and determined that Ali’s kidneys were damaged from the ravages of boxing.  Pacheco sent copies of the report with his findings to Ali, his wife Veronica, Herbert Muhammad, and Ali’s head trainer Angelo Dundee.  When neither responded to Pacheco, the physician stepped down and withdrew his services as Ali’s doctor.

It should have come as no surprise then that Ali lost his title in his next fight.  Out of shape, over confident, unmotivated and a bad fight plan caused Ali to lose a decision to Leon Spinks, a 13 month professional who was fighting in only his eighth professional fight. 

Embarrassed by the defeat, Ali for one last time dedicated himself to getting in the best possible shape and in a return match seven months later turned back the clock and won his title back from Spinks with a unanimous decision.

In 1980 when Ali first publicly announced he was making a comeback, most knowledgeable members of the boxing media openly opposed it.  Most outspoken of all was Ferdie Pacheco who only saw catastrophe in Ali’s future should he continue fighting.  Due to increasing media pressure who by now were questioning Ali’s health, The Nevada State Athletic Commission had Ali examined at Minnesota’s Mayo Clinic as a prerequisite to being granted a boxing license.

On July 23 1980 Ali checked into the clinic for a two-day stay.  It was here that Ali’s general health was evaluated while an examination was made for any evidence of kidney damage.  The preliminary examinations found no proof of kidney damage and Dr. Frank Howard would report that Ali appeared to be in ‘excellent general medical health’.  A neurological exam however would provide some unsettling findings.

Ali’s neurological exam was conducted by Dr. Frank Howard.  During this time a CAT scan taken of Ali’s brain revealed a small cavum septum pellucidum (a hole in the membrane separating the ventricles).  Dr. Howard diagnosed this as being a congenital abnormality and unrelated to any head trauma Ali may have endured.  What Dr. Howard didn’t note was whether or not this hole can become enlarged with concussive blows to the head.

An examination of Ali’s speech detected a mild ataxic dysarthia (difficulty in coordinating the muscles used in speaking).  In physical testing it was noted that Ali did not hop with expected agility and in a finger to nose test he showed a slight degree of missing his target, motor skills that were more pronounced with fatigue.

Despite these warning signs that Ali was perhaps showing early signs of brain damage, Dr. Howard felt there were no specific findings to prohibit him from fighting.

Around this time an article in the British press quoted a neurologist who had studied films of Ali over the years and was convinced that he was showing tell tale signs of brain damage.  Don King, heavily refuted this long distance diagnosis and suggested Ali should launch a $2,000.000 court action. The Ali-Holmes fight was one of the only fights King had promoted with his own money on the line.  He wasn’t about to let a doctor from overseas threaten the bout being cancelled.

The Mayo Clinic report was forwarded to the Nevada State Athletic Committee who in turn granted Ali a boxing license.

TRAINING

On August 2, Ali set up camp at Deer Lake and began serious training to challenge Holmes.  Ali who had weighed 237 lbs when examined by the Mayo Clinic had two months to get himself in top shape to go 15 rounds if necessary.  Ali’s projected weight by fight time was to be around 221 lbs the same as what it was when he had defeated Leon Spinks in his last fight two years earlier.

It was here that for the next four weeks Ali began summoning the discipline to prepare him for the ordeal of championship combat.  Each day Ali engaged in heavy workouts consisting of early morning runs, rope skipping, shadow boxing, bag work and sparring with 22 year old Tim Witherspoon a future WBC heavyweight champion.  Aided by a strict Muslim diet of chicken, steaks, potatoes, vegetables and fruits prepared for Ali by his long time cook Lana Shabazz , the extra pounds slowly began to melt from his frame.

On August 29 Ali broke camp and came to New York and sparred seven rounds before a crowd of more than 1,000 at the Felt Forum in Madison Square Garden.  By all accounts from his entourage Ali was in great shape and his spirits were good.

In early September Ali arrived in Las Vegas and checked into suite 301 in Caesars Palace.  Ali, who now weighed 224 lbs, would begin each day by waking up at 3:30 AM and running 6 miles across the Dunes Golf Course.  At 6:15 AM Ali would eat a daily breakfast of scrambled eggs, whole wheat toast and fruit juice prepared in his room by Shabazz as Ali would study video tapes of Holmes’ fight with Weaver.

After breakfast Ali would take to ‘The Terrible Table’ a 3 X 7 foot shiny vinyl orange rubbing table in which Ali would perform a series of different calisthenics aimed at strengthening his mid-section.  With the assistance of trainer Luis Sarria, Ali would perform up to thirteen variations of exercises with such original titles as Belly Buster, Scissors Mambo, The Leg Spin, The Bo Bo Circle and The Green Bay Packer Run-Em-Out-Of-Camp Rock.

When Ali trained for the Spinks rematch, advisor Lloyd Wells had kept a daily diary meticulously logging Ali’s training regimen.  In 39 days of training for that fight Ali had performed 8,024 repetitions of these exercises.  Ali’s one day record was 517.

On the day of September 10, with the Holmes fight still 22 days away, Ali performed 536 repetitions on the table bringing his count to an even 10,000.  In late September Ali was up to 13,947 repetitions performed on his personal torture rack.

In the afternoons Ali would head to the Caesar’s Palace Sports Pavilion for public workouts which were overseen by trainers Drew ‘Bundini’ Brown and Wali Youngblood and were videotaped by Lloyd Wells.   Ali’s gym workouts in Las Vegas consisted of skipping, bag work, shadowboxing and sparring.  On the same day of September 10, Ali sparred 36 straight minutes without a rest using seven different sparring partners. 

The betting odds which had opened at 3-1 for Holmes soon dropped to 2-1 then 9-5.  The day after Ali sparred 36 minutes without a rest the odds had dropped again, this time to 8-5.  By fight time the odds would be 6 ½ -5 ½ in favor of Holmes.

With his moustache now shaved off and his fighter’s physique returned Ali outwardly appeared to have turned back the clock. Ring Magazine the Bible of Boxing agreed reinstating Ali in their top ten rankings at #5.

While the majority of boxing experts were picking Holmes to win there were also those who believed Ali would perform yet another miracle and defeat Holmes.  There was one person polled however who was adamant that Holmes would win.  Don King breaking the tradition of promoters being neutral stated “Ali is the greatest of all time, but he will meet his Waterloo in Holmes, the baddest heavyweight in the world today.  This will be Ali’s last hurrah.  Holmes by KO.”

THYROLAR

With approximately two weeks until fight time Ali received a visit in his hotel room from Dr. Charles Williams. Williams, was Islam leader Elijah Muhammad's doctor and was asked to be a part of Ali's fight group by his Muslim adviser, Herbert Muhammad. 

Williams advised Ali that he was suffering from a hypothyroid condition and gave him one hundred pills of the prescription drug Thyrolar.  Ali was in fighting trim at this time, and his weight was at 222 lbs. What caused Williams to make this diagnosis in the absence of any medical testing is puzzling.  Ali had been thoroughly examined at the Mayo Clinic less than two months prior and there were no indications then that Ali suffered from hypothyroidism.  Just as puzzling is why Williams gave Ali a potentially hazardous prescription drug then neglected to monitor his condition when he was two weeks away from engaging in a potentially grueling 15 round fight. 

While it is unclear whether or not Ali knew Thyrolar was potentially hazardous it is highly unlikely he had been made aware of the side effects.  Thyrolar is known to cause fatigue, sluggishness, headache, increased blood pressure, tremor, nausea, increased heart rate, frequent urination and weight loss among others.  The drug also interferes with the body’s self cooling mechanisms, causing the body to dehydrate then overheat, not exactly a side effect Ali needed when he was about to fight Holmes in an outdoor arena in the desert during an unseasonably hot spell.  To complicate matters, Williams advised Ali to take one tablet daily but Ali believing the drug was like a vitamin began taking three a day.

Ali was no stranger to taking supplements near fight time when prescribed by a doctor.  As far back as 1976 Ali had shown signs of being sluggish and unmotivated in training.  At that time Ali associate Gene Kilroy contacted Dr. Roger Kendall who performed a blood test which indicated that Ali’s blood was low in iron.  A vitamin supplement program consisting of chelated iron, multivitamins rich in the B-vitamins, extra antioxidant vitamins and vitamin B-15 (later banned by the FDA) quickly normalized his blood chemistry.  Ali would continue to take vitamin B-15 as a supplement during his training for five consecutive fights against JimmyYoung, Richard Dunn, Ken Norton, Alfredo Evangelista and Earnie Shavers.

During Ali’s training and several days before his rematch with Leon Spinks, Ali had complained of weariness.  A blood test at that time revealed Ali’s blood was low in salt, iron and potassium.  After defeating Spinks, Ali gave credit in a press conference to his ‘vitamin-charged juices’ and to the doctor who had prescribed “half a pint of ice cream and a big hunk of honey, thirty minutes before the fight.”

In 1974 prior to fighting George Foreman, Ali had appeared tired in training.  Dr. Williams again in the absence of any medical testing, concluded that Ali had hypoglycemia and should eat a peach cobbler before the fight.  This diagnosis was not supported by Ali’s physician at the time Ferdie Pacheco who in the absence of any supporting proof took no action.

Dr. Williams knew Ali well and had been around him since 1972 when he fought Mac Foster in Tokyo.  It would make sense then that Williams as an Ali entourage insider would have been aware of Ali’s previous medical history regarding blood tests and subsequent corrective measures by vitamin supplementation.  If Williams was basing his hypothyroid diagnosis on Ali perhaps looking tired or sluggish should he have not first done a blood test to determine the cause as had been done in the past?

One thing is certain.  Once Ali began taking Thyrolar his condition immediately began to steadily and noticeably deteriorate.  As fight time rapidly approached, friends, family and well wishers unaware that Ali was heavily medicated, noted that he looked slow and debilitated and some of them suggested the fight be postponed.  Two days before the fight Ali was physically unable to run half a mile. 

Among those that noted Ali’s debilitated condition was his mother Odessa Clay who came to Las Vegas to watch her son fight.  Odessa had ringside seats but after seeing Ali she changed her mind and never left the hotel at fight time.  Instead, Odessa stayed in her room and waited in the bathroom with a friend while other family members watched the fight through the window, using binoculars.

Angelo Dundee, Ali’s longtime trainer arrived in Las Vegas a week before fight time and at first liked what he saw.  When he saw Ali training however he was less than impressed.  During one such training session Ali was sparring with journeyman heavyweight Marty Monroe.   Ali was known for taking it easy on his sparring partners but he would usually open up for 10 or 15 seconds at the end of a round.  Dundee begged Ali to show him something but by that point Ali was unable to and was too far gone to show Dundee much of anything.

To make matters worse, a post fight exam would later turn up evidence of the synthetic stimulant Benzedrine in Ali’s system.  Benzedrine is the trade name for amphetamine and it is a drug that causes users to not eat or sleep and burn off a lot of energy by physical activity which results in the user becoming exhausted.  As a result, users often feel fatigued with other side effects such as blurred vision, and dizziness.  When amphetamine users eventually stop they are likely to feel depressed and lethargic.  Heavy amphetamine use can damage blood vessels and cause heart failure, especially among people with existing high blood pressure or heart trouble, or amongst those who over-exert themselves while using the drug.

How or why Ali ended up taking Benzedrine, what doses or even how long he had been a user is unclear.  What is clear is that with Ali taking a potent mix of Thyrolar and Benzedrine he was about to enter the ring as a ticking time bomb and was facing a very serious health risk, perhaps even death.

On October 1, Ali somehow passed the pre-fight physical administered by Dr. Donald Romeo, the appointed Nevada State Athletic Commission ringside physician.  Ali then weighed in for the fight at 217 ½ lbs.  It was the lightest Ali had weighed since facing George Foreman six years earlier. 

THE FIGHT

On Thursday October 2, 1980 at 8:07 pm, Ali entered the ring which was constructed in an open air 24,790 seat arena.  The temperature that day at ringside had been 100 degrees.  Now night time, but under the hot television lights, the temperature remained the same.  Ali appeared serene as he waited for Holmes to enter which he did seven minutes later.  Upon seeing Holmes, Ali began leading the sell out crowd in a chant of “Ali!  Ali! Several times Ali made attempts like he was about to attack Holmes but was held back by Angelo Dundee and Wali Youngblood.  Holmes was dead serious and for the most part ignored Ali except to give the former champ a forearm to the chest when Ali stood in his path. 

As the two fighters listened to referee Richard Green’s instructions Ali continued to taunt Holmes by telling him “I’m your master.”  On this night Ali’s pre-fight act was the closest he would ever look to resembling the fighter he once was.

Once the fight began it was obvious something was not right.  Ali spent the early rounds wide eyed and posturing, talking to Holmes with his right hand cocked but he rarely threw a punch.  Holmes for his part set about establishing his left jab working it to both Ali’s head and body with an occasional left hook or straight right.  Holmes was fighting at a measured pace and winning the rounds while he tried to figure out what Ali was holding back.

In between rounds Ali’s corner quickly became frustrated and began telling him to start throwing punches.  Ali told Youngblood he was tired and would later say that he had been tired as early as the first round.  Also troubling to Ali’s corner men was the fact that despite fighting under hot lights in the heat of the desert, Ali was not sweating.  Dundee began asking Ali what was wrong and if he was alright.  Ali would later complain of lethargy, weakness and shortness of breath during the fight. 

As the fight wore on into the middle rounds Ali tried occasionally pushing out his jab as Holmes’ own piston like jab had already raised a welt under Ali’s eye.  Ali’s facial expression during these rounds began to change.  First Ali began blinking often before adopting a blank expressionless death mask.  During these rounds Ali would later state he was dazed and in a dream.  In the first eight rounds Ali would be hit a total of 195 times.

In the ninth round Holmes trapped Ali on the ropes who by now wasn’t doing much more than just standing stationary with his gloves in front of his face.  A Holmes right uppercut hurt Ali and Holmes battered him but Ali refused to fall.

In the tenth round Ali was a shell and looked like a man half-asleep.  Holmes to his credit, realizing Ali had nothing, pulled his punches and used mainly his jab to avoid hurting Ali.  When Holmes returned to his corner he looked at Giachetti and shrugged his shoulders.  In the last two rounds of the fight he had hit Ali 125 times.

In Ali’s corner, ringside physician Dr. Donald Romeo went to check on the fighter along with referee Richard Green.  At this time, Dundee told Green he was stopping the fight.  Bundini Brown protested and grabbed Dundee by the arm saying “No, no!”  Ripping his arm free, Angelo turned to Green and told him, “The ball game’s over.   I’m the chief second. I stop the fight.”

Ali’s dream of a fourth world title was over.  The king was dead.

THE AFTERMATH

The peculiar set of circumstances leading up to the Ali-Holmes fight will likely never be completely understood.  Why for example did the Nevada State Athletic Commission grant Ali a license when according to the Mayo Clinic report he showed signs of physical impairment and a hole in the membrane of his brain?  Why didn’t the NSAC at least question these findings before being so quick to grant Ali a boxing license?

Equally peculiar but no less disturbing is that Ali was given Thyrolar and Benzedrine, two drugs that were guaranteed to diminish Ali’s ability to perform while at the same time putting him at the risk of serious physical harm.

Why did Ali not seek to postpone the fight once he became debilitated by the drugs?  Ali arrived in Vegas in excellent shape running 6 miles each morning and doing a full afternoon gym workout yet two days before the fight was incapable of running half a mile.  What made Ali so determined to get into the ring that night when he knew his physical condition had been so dramatically compromised? 

After the fight, when Ali was medically examined at the UCLA Medical Centre it was confirmed that he did not suffer from hypothyroidism.  When Ali’s drug use became public knowledge, Dr. Williams would backtrack on his original diagnosis by acknowledging that the drugs he had given Ali would have affected his self cooling mechanisms causing a rise in his body temperature.   Williams would then admit that this “led to heat exhaustion that went into heat stroke with an intermediate period of slight stupor and maybe delirium.”  Williams then stated, “I may have placed him in jeopardy inadvertently.” 

These admissions from Dr. Williams came only days after the Ali-Holmes fight.  How could Dr. Williams not have known this just few weeks earlier when he mis-diagnosed Ali with hypothyroidism and gave him 100 Thyrolar pills to consume?  If Ali was on these drugs and reportedly looked fatigued and debilitated how could he have passed the NSAC pre-fight physical only a day before the fight?

Was Ali set-up?  Was he sabotaged?  Unfortunately a formal enquiry into these questions never took place, so it is unlikely we will ever get the true answers. After the Ali-Holmes fight, the NSAC deflected the blame and instead met to decide whether they would take action against Ali for his drug use.  Ali’s boxing license was subsequently revoked by the state of Nevada.

While Ali would fight one more time, losing a ten round decision to Trevor Berbick, the fall-out from the Ali-Holmes fight is still felt all these years later.

Today Ali is a ghost of the man we once knew.  Plagued by ‘Parkinson’s Syndrome’ most likely brought on by the head trauma he received as a professional fighter, Ali’s physical condition appears to decline each year.  It is unknown how much of Ali’s condition can be attributed to the punishment he received in the Holmes fight.

Larry Holmes would go on to establish himself as a great heavyweight champion eventually losing his title in the ring to Michael Spinks.  In an eerie coincidence, almost eight years after fighting Ali, a thirty-eight year old Holmes would be lured out of retirement by Don King to face then undefeated heavyweight champion Mike Tyson.  Predictably Holmes never won a round and was stopped in four rounds.

Don King would never relinquish control of the heavyweight division.  Today 26 years after Ali-Holmes, King continues to rule and promote heavyweight championship contests.