It had been a few months since I touched bases with strength and conditioning coach Alex Ariza but I was happy to have spotted the Columbian native yesterday while inside of the Wild Card Boxing Club in Los Angeles for Manny Pacquiao's media day. Pacquiao is a few weeks away from the second defense of his WBO welterweight title and is reportedly running on all cylinders as his May 7th date with Shane Mosley at the MGM Grand approaches.
There has been nothing but glowing reports coming from Pacquiao's camp and I checked with Ariza to see how everything was progressing.
"I always say that I hate saying that something is perfect, knock on wood because you never know what's going to happen, but it couldn't be any better right now," said Ariza. "We're right on schedule now. I keep a little bit ahead of schedule. Hopefully with some things coming up it will give us a day or two during the week to take a day off here and there. Other than that I couldn't ask for anything more."
Sometimes when a fighter is in camp and performing at a high level they will peak too soon and leave some of their best stuff in the gym by the time the fight approaches. It has happened to the best of fighters and I got the sense that perhaps Ariza was worried as to whether Pacquiao was coming into his own a bit too soon.
"Of course I do," he continued. "I really do. I'm really worried about it right now. I mean, especially the way he's just been going through rounds and asking for more, more, more, and more. You just know that he's in that groove. He knows his body but I'm always the one that's thinking at some time you are going to have a break."
For this camp Pacquiao has said to have had some great sparring with the likes of Karim Mayfield, Raymund Beltran, David Rodela and Shawn Porter, whom is with the Filipino icon a second time following his overseas debut in the Philippines to help him prepare for his November 2009 clash with Miguel Cotto. Ariza confirmed that the sessions have been lively and that he has seen a change in the 23-year old Porter when I asked him who had stood out the most.
"The sparring sessions have been awesome. I think always it's going to be Shawn Porter. He's been with Manny only one time, and that was with Cotto, and he's made a vast improvement from when I saw him back in the day. So I , for sure, think that he's giving him the best work. But we have Beltran, who is also making a ton of improvement. Mayfield turned out to be really good as well," said Ariza.
This camp looks to be a huge contrast from Pacquiao's preparation for his fight with Antonio Margarito last November, as he was distracted by his duties as a congressman while in his native land in Baguio. In the fight against Margarito Ariza noted that Pacquiao took more punishment than he should have and even showed himself to be tired late in the fight.
It's something that stuck with Pacquiao and he seems set to not let it happen again.
"I like to think that was a lesson learned," said a reflective Ariza. "Maybe with not knowing that politics was going to be as difficult as it was and taking as much time as it did from him. It was one of those things that required a lot of time, a lot of thinking, and a lot of studying. Boxing just really wasn't balancing out at that time so we lost a lot of ground on that. So maybe you just realize during the fight that he didn't want to go through anything like that again."
Before ending our talk I asked Ariza whether he had seen his ex-charge Amir Khan perform this past weekend with his technical decision victory over Paul McCloskey in his native England. Ariza had been working with Khan for a few years but saw his relationship with the star severed after he got into a dispute with Amir's team over money in regards to his assistance for his December victory over Marcos Maidana.
Despite seeing that bridge burned, Ariza says that he has no hard feelings towards Khan, the WBA junior welterweight champion of the world.
"I did, I did. Of course I [saw his fight]. I don't have any ill wills towards the guy. I hope he wins and I don't want to see him get hurt or anything. But I don't need to say anything that hasn't been said about it."
Source: Examiner.com
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