In the immediate aftermath, the future US president was hired as an adviser amid a rift with long-time manager Bill Cayton and was still a key player at the time of this fight. Trump and Tyson initially enjoyed a fruitful relationship in the late 1980s after the real estate tycoon spent a reported $11million to make the 91-second fight between Tyson and Michael Spinks in 1988. 'Robin would go out shopping and I would go downstairs to the back of the hotel where this young girl had a room… so that was my training for Douglas.'īy the time Douglas landed in Tokyo, Tyson had been in Japan for 11 days but was barely seen in public. One rare open sparring session ended with Tyson so exhausted the spectators had to be sent away. During another training exercise, Tyson was knocked down heavily by his partner Greg Page but neither the fighter nor his entourage heeded the warning signs.Ī growing presence around the Tyson camp was Donald Trump, by then a hugely influential figure in American life. Reflecting on his time in Japan, Tyson said: 'Besides having sex with the maids, I was seeing this young Japanese girl who I had had sex with the last time I was in Japan. In his memoir, R&B singer Bobby Brown recalls how he partied with Tyson until 3am the night before the fight, and there were plenty more women beside in Tokyo where his exploits with local geisha girls became the stuff of legend. Upon arrival in Japan - he arrived 11 days before Douglas - he was 30 pounds overweight and suffering from addiction and depression. His marriage to Robin Givens had also ended acrimoniously shortly beforehand. Tyson, by contrast, was rarely seen training in the build-up to the fight having sacked long-term coach Kevin Rooney. Tyson admitted having sex with Japanese women as his marriage to wife Robin (above) had disintegrated before the fight against Douglas In fact, it was a death-bed promise made to Lula Pearl that inspired Douglas to victory, often running on raw emotion to overpower the greatest puncher on the planet at the time. His mother, Lula Pearl, died 23 days before the bout, while his son's mother battled serious kidney problems that would later be diagnosed as cancer, and his wife left him. While much commentary reflects on Tyson's troubled approach to the fight, Douglas also endured a difficult build-up. The entire world knew, and feared, Mike Tyson.īut his destructive victories - including a 93-second win over Carl Williams in the fight before Douglas - papered over many of the cracks appearing both professionally and personally in Tyson's life. Coming into the fight against Douglas, 33 of his 37 straight wins had been by knockout. Iron Mike's stunning combination of hand speed, defensive prowess and awesome power had seen him become the youngest heavyweight champion in history, aged 20 years and four months, in November 1986. Less than a year later he became the first heavyweight to own all three major belts – WBA, WBC, and IBF - and become undisputed champion. The defending champion was nothing short of a phenomenon. Ranked as the No 7 heavyweight at the time, Douglas had suffered a TKO in his 1987 title fight against Tony Tucker, but a string of six straight victories earned him the right to face Tyson. When asked by a customs official how long he expected to be working in Japan, Associated Press correspondent Ed Schuyler quipped: 'Oh, about ninety seconds'.
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