"I'm telling you, Manny's not messing around. He's not fucking around. He gets up at 5:30 AM every day, so I need to be done and out the house and meet Manny by the time it's 6:00 AM wherever he's at. Amir's up at 6:00 AM, then Manny gets finished, then Julio [Cesar Chavez Jr.] comes in later on in the afternoon, then Manny, then Amir, then I do Julio's strength training at night because Julio comes in at 9:00 in the morning to train just to skip some of the craziness, and then I do Julio's strength training at 8:00 PM and that lasts until 10:00 PM, so I don't even come home," stated world-class strength and conditioning coach Alex Ariza, who discussed the hectic schedule has in getting Manny Pacquiao, Julio Cesar Chavez Jr. and Amir Khan prepared for their respective fights, which are all right around the corner. You don't want to miss what he had to say about that, his thoughts on Victor Conte's work with Nonito Donaire, and much more. Check it out!
BT: Speaking of Victor Conte, what did you think about the way Nonito Donaire looked physically in his last fight? He looked a little off to me.
AA: Off? Man, that guy looked smoother than a Coke can. What do you mean off? You come in at the bare minimum of weight. Listen, here's a couple of things, and this is no knock against Nonito. He's just a fighter and he's just following what his team is trying to tell him to do, but how stupid can you be if the weigh-in limit is 118, why bring your guy 2 1/2 pounds under? Why? Do you know how much extra fluid that is? I mean, take a bottle, fill up 2 point whatever pounds, however many pounds he came in under, with water and see how much fluid that is you're taking out. You gotta remember, electrolytes and valuable trace minerals and things like that can't be replaced within a 24-hour period, so you can't explain anything other than the fact that you're just a complete moron and you didn't know how to bring your fighter down and yo accidentally went over. There's no benefit to bringing your fighter in except at the limit, if you don't have to, especially a guy who said he had to lose 7 pounds the day before, or what it was. So you lose 9 [pounds] instead?
BT: Yeah man, I thought that was really odd. I mean, obviously, like you said, Zab Judah looked good, but performed like crap, but even Andre Berto, he looked so gassed after about 3 or 4 rounds.
AA: I know. I tell you what, that's why I said, sometimes these kids will think that, you know, Victor can say, "Oh, you take this. This is going to increase red blood cells. And you sleep in this with a bag over your face and it will simulate high-altitude training," you know, he bullshits these guys and they don't know any better. It's not their fault.
BT: It definitely seems like he's taking full advantage of the name he made from his days with the BALCO.
AA: Oh, for sure. He's a salesman, bro. That's all he's ever been. That's why he's gotta sit there and point the finger at somebody else and take the attention off of him, because his sorry ass doesn't have the mental capacity to understand why my fighters are blowing shit out of the water and looking the way they do and he used to be cheating. The way he was cheating and doing all the dirty shit he was doing, that's how my fighters look now, so that's the only way he can comprehend it. He's gotta look at himself in the mirror and go, "Why am I coming up short?" And he better come up with an answer because I tell you what, eventually, the athletes that he does have wil sit there and look at him and go, "What the fuck? Why am I not doing that? Why am I not going in the ring and Larry Merchant, and Jim Lampley, and everybody else commentating about how strong, how quick, how explosive I look, and how my physique is?"
BT: Well, the first one who might find out is Nonito Donaire because when he moves up in weight and starts fighting some of these bigger dudes, he might be in for a shock. They might have to tone down some of that talk about him being better than Manny.
AA: Right? He had a punching bag in front of him and he couldn't get him out of there. And it's sad to say, but for a guy who weighed in at 116 pounds, if that's the most symmetrically built and defined that you can get, you're better off going to somebody who's deaf, dumb and blind because there wasn't an ab on him. The last thing he should be doing is flexing. He should have stood on that scale and ran the fuck off that thing (laughing).
BT: (Laughing) You know, he kind of looked like Erik Morales does when he weighs in.
AA: Yes. Yeah, that's how Morales looks. Smoother than a fucking Coke can. Not a definition, no separation, no nothing; no stryation anywhere. Like I said, he should've climbed on there and jumped right off.
BT: So what's up with Manny? It's getting down to crunch time now.
AA: I'm telling you, Manny's not messing around. He's not fucking around. He gets up at 5:30 AM every day, so I need to be done and out the house and meet Manny by the time it's 6:00 AM wherever he's at. Amir's up at 6:00 AM, then Manny gets finished, then Julio [Cesar Chavez Jr.] comes in later on in the afternoon, then Manny, then Amir, then I do Julio's strength training at night because Julio comes in at 9:00 in the morning to train just to skip some of the craziness, and then I do Julio's strength training at 8:00 PM and that lasts until 10:00 PM, so I don't even come home. My lady's like, "Where the fuck are you?"
BT: I saw some pics of Julio down in Texas when he had the press conference; he looked pretty good.
AA: He looks very good. He's 173 pounds, kind of bouncing back and forth. I know he's focused on wanting to get closer and closer to weight, but I said, "Listen, we got a lot of time. Let's hold the strength. Let's stay where we're at." Sparring is going phenomenally. He's got some tough sparring in there. He's going to come out and he's going to make a statement. A lot of people are going to take a second look at him.
BT: I actually think Manfredo is a pretty good fight for Julio.
AA: You know, it's a good fight for the fans because Julio doesn't do a lot of holding and hitting and shit like that, and neither does Manfredo; he comes straight ahead. I don't think it's going to go very long, but what people will see is some good action.
BT: Amir's fight with Lamont Peterson should be pretty good too.
AA: Very good. You know, I tell you what, I'm taking that fight more serious than I am any of them.
BT: Oh yeah? Why is that?
AA: I have a lot of respect for Lamont. He's got a lot of things going for him. He's quick, he's got good power, good counter puncher; you just never know, man. A guy like that can have the night of his life.
BT: Yeah, especially fighting in his own backyard.
AA: Yeah, and he has to be, so I gotta make sure we're just as pumped as he is and ready to rock and roll and make this thing a good fight for everyone.
BT: All those fights are right around the corner.
AA: All around the corner, bro. All of them.
BT: So Manny's up at 5:30 AM and is more serious than ever. Are you guys going to have to taper him down a little sooner than normal?
AA: We're trying to do it now, you know? We made some mistakes in the last camp, especially in the Margarito one, so he's starting to recognize that you can't keep pushing your body, pushing your body, or eventually it's going to push back, and the way it pushes back is by not letting you do or not letting you feel the way you want to or just not feeling right, so when he starts to feel like something's not going right, he'll take the morning off, he'll relax, and that, to me, is the most important. I've always been about recovery, you know? Training hard is fine, but rest more, just as hard, and recover just as much as you train.
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