Muhammad Ali: What happened when Michael Parkinson asked the boxer if he worried he'd end up a 'shambling wreck'

'You’ve seen them at every boxing occasion and what people are frightened of is that they don’t want that to happen to you'

Parkinson's disease may have come to define Muhammad Ali's retirement, yet the boxer once refused to admit such an illness would possibly affect him, even towards the end of his career.

During a prophetical interview with Michael Parkinson back in 1981, Ali was asked if he was concerned about the long term effects of his sport.

“You’ve seen what can happen to fighters. You’ve seen those shambling wrecks that come around,"Parkinson presaged.

"You’ve seen them at every boxing occasion and what people are frightened of is that they don’t want that to happen to you.”

Only a few months before the interview, Ali had gone 10 rounds with Larry Holmes, "a loss that effectively ended his career," according the The New York Times.

Larry Holmes, Muhammad Ali and George Foreman, pictued together in October 2015 (Getty)

Ali's answer was full of his usual bragadoccio, suggesting that others simply couldn't see what he could and as always he would be the master of his own fate.

ome people can see farther than others," Ali explained.

"So therefore when people judge what I'm doing with their logic, it can't be done."

"Their reasoning, their knowledge and their logic clashes with my superior belief."

He followed up his response with a jibe at Parkinson that he himself was no ordinary boxer, able to take over the host's show as he had already done, and therefore wouldn't suffer the consequences others had to endure.

The confidence Ali exuded at this late stage of his career, even as he suffered heavy defeats, was a continuation of his belief that he was the world's greatest.

The man's charm, intelligence and eloquence would only serve to increase the poignancy of his own frailty in older age and thrust Parkinson's disease into the public consciousness.