Muhammad Ali vs Richard Dunn

Muhammad Ali retained the WBA and WBC heavyweight titles at the Olympiahalle in Munich on May 24, 1976, stopping Richard Dunn in the fifth round after 2 minutes 5 seconds. Ali weighed 220 pounds and Dunn 207. Herbert Tomser was the referee, with Raymond Baldeyrou and Jose Fernando Perotti appointed as judges. It was Ali’s seventh defence of both championships in his second reign, and it proved to be the final knockout victory of his professional career.

Dunn, a southpaw from Halifax in Yorkshire, came into the contest as the British, Commonwealth and European heavyweight champion. His record was 33 wins and 9 defeats, and he had earned the chance by stopping Bernd August in three rounds at the Royal Albert Hall the previous month. He was a strong and courageous domestic champion, but this was a considerable rise in class. Ali, even in his thirty-fifth year and no longer the quick-footed fighter of his youth, was too experienced and too accurate for him.

The opening rounds clearly showed the difference. Dunn tried to advance behind his right jab and southpaw stance, but he could not make Ali uncomfortable. The champion moved enough to keep the challenger reaching, then stepped in with single shots and short combinations. Ali did not box at a frantic pace, but he controlled the distance and pace almost from the start. Dunn’s attacks were honest rather than sharp, and he had difficulty landing anything cleanly.

In the third round, Ali began to increase the authority of his punches. Dunn kept coming forward, but he was being caught on the way in and was unable to match the champion’s hand speed. Ali’s right hand, used over Dunn’s southpaw lead, became the telling punch. The challenger remained upright and willing, but the contest was beginning to look less like a championship fight and more like a brave man trying to survive a level he could not quite reach.

The fourth round settled the matter in all but name. Ali dropped Dunn three times, each knockdown showing the gulf between them. Dunn rose each time and tried to continue, but he was hurt and increasingly open. The champion, sensing the finish, did not waste much. He picked the punches, found the gaps, and put Dunn under pressure without needing to force the pace wildly.

Dunn came out for the fifth, but he had little left with which to change the contest. Ali scored two more knockdowns, the second bringing the stoppage at 2:05. Dunn had been on the floor five times in all. He was game to the end, but bravery was not enough against a champion who could still finish an overmatched opponent once he had measured him.

The result did little to alter Ali’s standing, for he had been expected to win and did so comfortably. Yet the bout has its place in his record. It was the last time Muhammad Ali stopped an opponent, and it came between the disputed Jimmy Young decision and the coming third fight with Ken Norton. For Dunn, the evening was a hard but honourable defeat. He had shared a ring with the heavyweight champion of the world, but the contest confirmed that European success and world-title class were two different things.

Ali vs Richard Dunn was not a great heavyweight title fight, but it showed where Ali was in 1976. He had just looked poor against Jimmy Young; he had Manila behind him, Norton ahead of him, and the old magic was coming in flashes rather than whole rounds. Dunn was British, Commonwealth and European champion, a southpaw from Halifax, and he had earned his shot by stopping Bernd August at the Royal Albert Hall. But world level is a different room altogether.

Ali came in at 220 pounds, Dunn at 207, and the fight was at the Olympiahalle in Munich for the WBA and WBC heavyweight titles. Ali won at 2:05 of the fifth round, after putting Dunn down five times. BoxRec lists it as Ali’s seventh defence of both belts in that second reign.

Dunn was brave, I will give him that. He came forward, tried to make the southpaw stance mean something, and did not arrive just to fall over. But he was too slow, too open, and too far below Ali in class. Ali’s right hand over the southpaw lead was there all night, and once he had measured Dunn, the knockdowns started coming. Dunn went down three times in the fourth and twice more in the fifth before referee Herbert Tomser had seen enough.

This was also Ali’s last knockout win, which makes it historically important even if the contest itself was one-sided. ESPN’s record also lists it as his final stoppage before the later points fights with Norton, Evangelista, Shavers, and then the Spinks chapter.

I do not dress Dunn up as some hidden monster. He was a good domestic and European champion who ran into an all-time great. Ali was past his best, no doubt, but even a fading Ali had enough speed, timing and spite to expose that gap properly.