Former boxer LeDoux has a new fight:

Lou Gehrig's

Dave Campbell

Scott LeDoux once went blow for blow and toe to toe with several heavyweight greats during a resilient, if unspectacular, career in the ring in the late 1970s and early '80s.

Last summer, this 6-foot-2, now 250-pound (1.88-meter, now 113-kilogram) former boxer realized he could no longer button his shirt.

"I thought it was arthritis in my shoulder," LeDoux said.

If only it were that simple.

The 60-year-old LeDoux was diagnosed with Lou Gehrig's disease, he confirmed this week. Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, or ALS, attacks nerve cells in the brain and the spinal cord and robs from people who have it the ability to move and speak. The majority of patients die from respiratory failure within five years of the progress of symptoms, though there are exceptions.

There is no cure, however, and few options for treatment. "You've got to look at it as a fight in the main event," said LeDoux, nicknamed "The Fighting Frenchman" who finished with a 33-13-4 record according to the Web site, boxrec.com.

Indeed, LeDoux's past will certainly help shape his future. The mental stamina required to stand in the ring and spar for seven rounds with Larry Holmes for the WBC heavyweight title surely is on LeDoux's side as he deals with the onset of the disease.

He fought to a draw with Leon Spinks and Ken Norton and was stopped in the third round by George Foreman, before losing to Holmes in his home state by technical knockout in 1980.

The diagnosis last year left him very afraid, however, and very sad. His second wife, Carol, urged him to take antidepressant drugs.

"Suicide wasn't an option for me," LeDoux said in a phone interview from Florida, where he was traveling. "As my wife explained to me, 'What would I do if I left my kids before my time and left my grandchildren before my time?' So that's my goal: To fight the fight."

MINNEAPOLIS AP