Raul Frank was a tough welterweight who could take and give punishment. Frank fought the early part of his professional career in Guyana but migrated to the USA in the early 1990s.
On May 12, 2001 Frank made his second attempt at the vacant International Boxing Federation (IBF) welterweight title.He came up against undefeated American Vernon Forrest at the Madison Square Garden in Manhattan and lost via Unanimous Decision. It was the fourth defeat in 28 fights for the 31 year old Guyanese while Forrest (29) picked up his 32nd victory.
The two orthodox boxers first met in August of the previous year at the Mandalay Bay Casino in Las Vegas. An interesting affair was halted at one minute and 45 seconds of the third round and declared a No Contest after Frank was cut from an accidental head-butt.
The two were battling for the IBF title made vacant after Felix `Tito’ Trinidad moved up to junior middleweight. The result gave Frank the permission to join Andrew `Six Head’ Lewis as Guyanese to have No Contest results in a world title fight.
Lewis, the first from Guyana to win a world title, was defending the World Boxing Association welterweight title for the second time when a clash of heads at seven seconds of round two, caused the fights against Ricardo Mayorga to be stopped and declared a No Contest.
Lewis and Mayorga would again meet eight months later in March 2002.