Pacquiao does heavy workout on Good Friday

On a Good Friday, Manny Pacquiao put on a dazzling show for his fans and the media, and looked all set to conquer San Antonio once more.

The Wild Card Gym was almost packed as Pacquiao held a two-hour public workout, unlike the previous one where the entrance door was closed and video cameras shut off.

Pacquiao did his usual stuff — the usual stuff that could make an ordinary athlete faint.

He did a couple rounds of shadow boxing, a few more pounding the mitts with trainer Justine Fortune, longer minutes on the speed ball, double-end bag, punching bag and skipping ropes, plus the icing on the cake – around 500 crutches and sit-ups.

At times, Pacquiao just won’t stop.

Fortune had to remind him that he needed only two rounds on the punching bag, and Pacquiao would say "I want three!" and when Pinoy trainer Nonoy Neri would call for a break, the hard-punching boxer would counter "What break? No break!"

As he wrapped up the day’s work to his favorite Latino beat of Shakira, the crowd, including fans both young and old, gave him a round of applause.

And the familiar voice of Wild Card resident Macka Foley rang out: "Manny Pac-queeaow! The best pound-for-pound! Move over May-weather!"

More applause.

"He’s ready. He’s 95 percent," said Fortune, the beefy Australian ex-heavyweight who supervised Pacquiao’s training at Wild Card the last three weeks.

Buboy Fernandez, the other trainer, said Pacquiao is fit to climb the ring any day, any minute. So far after close to seven weeks, they’ve logged close to 120 rounds of sparring.

Pacquiao needed another hour before exiting the gym, granting interviews with the foreign and local press, and planting his signature on boxing gloves, t-shirts, caps, posters and even cellular phones.

"Salamat sa inyo. Salamat po (Thank you)," he would often say.

Saturday will be his last day of training at Wild Card as he flies to Texas Sunday morning for the final push toward his April showdown with undefeated Mexican Jorge Solis.

Pacquiao said he can’t wait to get there, and relive his sensational 2004 victory over Marco Antonio Barrera, also at the Alamodome.

"I’m excited for this fight. This will be a good fight. This fight is for our country. Not for anything else," he said.

Manny has hands full in buildup to Texas bout

Manny Pacquiao’s itinerary in San Antonio, Texas is out.

Top Rank big boss Bob Arum said the 28-year-old Filipino superstar will be quite busy once he arrives in San Antonio in the week heading to his April 14 fight with Jorge Solis at the Alamodome.

Pacquiao and his entourage of around 30, including his wife Jinkee, will fly to San Antonio from LA on Sunday morning, and is expected to take a rare day-off from his daily training.

Then on Monday he will hold a public workout shortly after lunch and will go straight to his hotel for some rest. In the evening, he’ll be off to the AT&T Center to watch an NBA game.

Arum said Pacquiao will be the special guest at ringside when San Antonio Spurs of Tim Duncan, Manu Ginobili and Robert Horry host the Portland Blazers of Zack Randolph and Brandon Roy.

"We know he loves basketball," said Arum of his fighter who once tossed the ceremonial pitch in a California Angels Major League game in his run-up to a 2005 clash with Hector Velasquez at Staples Center.

Tuesday will be the regular training and a meeting with San Antonio Mayor Phil Hardberger. The fight press conference is set Wednesday, probably the last day of training for Pacquiao.

On Thursday, Arum added, Pacquiao will have a satellite interview with the international press, and the day after will be the official weigh-in at the Alamodome where the Pinoy icon knocked out Marco Antonio Barrera in 2003.

"Then Saturday is fight night," said Arum.

And Pacquiao can get rid of Solis, fly back to Los Angeles the following morning, and back to Manila in an evening flight on Philippine Airlines.

Pacquiao raring to go

If there’s one guy at the Wild Card Boxing Club who knows Manny Pacquiao other than Freddie Roach, that’s Australian conditioning coach Justin Fortune.

Fortune is Wild Card guru Freddie Roach’s chief assistant, caretaker whenever Roach is away and he’s been in all of Pacquiao’s most memorable fights on US soil.

On Saturday afternoon, Fortune saw one significant sign that he knew is an indication of Pacquiao’s readiness for this week’s showdown with unheralded but dangerous Mexican puncher Jorge Solis.

"Once he does that, he’s ready," said Fortune after watching Pacquiao’s final and five-round sparring session in preparation for Solis, referring to the Filipino southpaw’s full display of antics against regular sparmate, the tall and rangy David Rodela.

Pacquiao and his team depart for San Antonio via American Airlines at 2:25 p.m. The non-stop flight will last three hours and he will be welcomed there by the first wave of Team Pacquiao members that will leave at 10:15 a.m. using LAX airport with a brief layover in Dallas.

On the eve of his departure for Texas, site of his epic knockout win over Marco Antonio Barrera in November 2003, Pacquiao looked superb in his workout.

"He (Pacquiao) doesn’t want to stop (training)," said Buboy Fernandez, who will help out in the cornerwork.

Pacquiao struck Rodela at least twice with his two fists, reminiscent of what the late action king Fernando Poe Jr. did in beating up countless villains in his movies.

On two occasions, Pacquiao rushed towards Rodela’s corner and threatened to whale away in reckless abandon without the startled sparmate’s knowledge and Pacquiao broke into laughter upon seeing the reaction on Rodela’s face.

"I knew that I was ready for this fight when I did 12 rounds of sparring last week," said Pacquiao as he was having a dinner of chicken tinola, fried fish and steamed rice at his apartment unit at the Palazzo, where members of his entourage and visitors congregate everyday after training.

Still, Pacquiao went serious a few times and whenever he opted to change his demeanor, he threw punches as though the guy in front of him was someone who stole his retirement money.

While Pacquiao’s mood was very relaxed, there was a brief moment just before he went down the ring to change that he became serious.

The fighter bowed his head in the corner where he usually gets pointers from his trainers and mumbled a prayer and the Wild Card’s chief of security, Rob Peters, had to politely ask everybody to pause for a moment of silence.

Pacquiao then thanked everyone in attendance as in the past and the crowd applauded the simple gesture.

Fight fans crave for Pacman-Barrera tiff

A rematch between Manny Pacquiao and Marco Antonio Barrera is still a fight many fans would like to see. And if everything falls into place, Pacquiao and Barrera will end up locking horns anew.

"That is still an attractive fight," said Top Rank chief Bob Arum on the prospects of matching the two this year.

In fact, Barrera is even reportedly attending Pacquiao’s bout against Jorge Solis of Mexico on Saturday night at the Alamodome in San Antonio, Texas.

Although Barrera lost to Juan Manuel Marquez last month on points, Arum believes Barrera, who suffered a savage 11th round knockout to Pacquiao in 2003, still has a huge following.

"Marquez doesn’t have a fan base," said Arum, noting that "Marquez is an anti-draw."

"We use to promote him and we would put on a show in a ballroom that has 3,000 seats and we could not fill them," said Arum, who once had Marquez under his promotional outfit before the Mexican signed up with Oscar De La Hoya’s Golden Boy Promotions (GBP).

Arum also revealed that the camp of another marquee name in the superfeatherweight category, Joan Guzman of the Dominican Republic, has sent word that it is also interested in seeing the undefeated Guzman rumble with Pacquiao.

Arum said Sycuan Promotions has a say in Guzman’s affairs even though he is promoted by GBP.

Top Rank had wanted to get Barrera for a Pacquiao rematch but Barrera turned down what Top Rank said was an attractive offer and opted to fight Marquez instead.

There is no definite timetable yet on Pacquiao’s fight after Solis since the Filipino icon has to go back to the Philippines and concentrate on his political bid as he is running for congressman in the first district of South Cotabato on May 14.

"It would all depend on the (result of the) elections," said Arum during a recent visit to the Wild Card.

Pacquiao leaves for San Antonio

FILIPINO boxing sensation Manny Pacquiao is set to leave Los Angeles for San Antonio to acclimatize himself with the Texas weather barely a week before his scheduled 12-round super featherweight clash with Jorge Solis of Mexico at the Alamodome.

The Alamodome, home of Tim Duncan and the San Antonio Spurs, is the site of Pacquiao's career-defining triumph over Mexican great Marco Antonio Barrera in November of 2003.

Now, over three years later, the Filipino southpaw will be back again in the place of that memorable victory against an undefeated boxer in Solis.

Pacquiao had his last sparring session at the Wild Card gym Saturday and his trainers, led by Justin Fortune, declared the boxer ready to fight.

If plans push through, Pacquiao is scheduled to watch the Spurs play in a home game, before the fighter takes care of his own battle atop the ring on April 14 (April 15 in Manila).

Pacquiao and Solis met for the first time Thursday when the Filipino bomber visited the Mexican during training at the Pound4Pound Gym in Los Angeles.

Pacquiao thought Solis is not that tall as the Mexican was earlier described to be.

Solis, who is 32-0 with 23 KOs, had earlier vowed to beat Pacquiao and shock the world.

Pacquiao trainers ‘fight’

WITH less than a week to go before his fight against Jorge Solis, a coup is seemingly in the offing within Manny Pacquiao’s camp.

Pacquiao, who had Freddie Roach in his corner in his epic trilogy with Eric Morales, is now being handled by Roach’s protégé Justin Fortune.

And according to Philboxing.com, Fortune doesn’t want Roach back in Pacquiao’s corner for the April 15 (RP time) fight at the Alamodome in Texas.

Roach is currently in Puerto Rico training Oscar dela Hoya against Floyd Mayweather Jr.

Incidentally, dela Hoya’s Golden Boy Promotions is locked in a legal battle with Bob Arum’s Top Rank, the promoter of the April 15 fight.

“Well, Freddie chose the bigger fighter (dela Hoya) and he can’t have both,” Fortune said in a report posted at Philboxing.com
According to the report, Fortune said he could handle the fight with Filipino trainers Buboy Fernandez and Nonoy Neri and that Roach can handle Pacquiao’s corner again when the Filipino icon gets a bout against marquee fighters like Marco Antonio Barrera.

Both Fortune and Manny Pacquiao have also told a press conference early in the week that they are not sure whether Roach will be in Texas for the fight.

However, Roach told boxingconfidential.com, “There is no doubt. I told both Manny and Justin I will be there. I am coming in on the day before the fight. Both Manny and Justin know very well that I am going to San Antonio. They both know for sure, no doubt, that I will be there to do my job just like I always do.”

Inconsistent

Still, two days after Roach’s interview, Fortune told a teleconference that he still wasn’t sure whether Roach would be in the fight.

For his part, Arum shot down Roach’s plan to attend the fight.

“You have to understand that Freddie is with dela Hoya. And, dela Hoya for the last month has been doing his damnedest to stop this fight. So, I mean, it’s really inconsistent with Freddie coming. Freddie is down there in Puerto Rico,”

Sparring partner feels Pacman’s wicked punch

No one knows better how strong Manny Pacquiao’s punches are these days than his sparring partner.

"He hits like he’s got metal weights in his hands," said Mexican David Rodela Saturday after sparring with Pacquiao for five hard rounds at the Wild Card Gym.

Pacquiao engaged Rodela in a thrilling workout that was held behind closed doors. At times the left-handed superstar tried to play around, unleashing moves made famous by the late Filipino king of movies Fernando Poe Jr.

In the last two rounds when Pacquiao turned on the heat, and in the final 30 seconds it looked like he was going for a knockout, catching Rodela with a long flurry that got almost everybody inside the gym up on their feet.

"When Manny does that I know he’s ready," said Justin Fortune, calling the shots in Pacquiao’s training in the absence of Freddie Roach who’s with Oscar dela Hoya in Puerto Rico.

"Puwede nga siya hindi tumama eh (I could’ve made him miss all day). Kaya sa last round, binugbog ko na (That’s why in the last round, I clobbered him)," said Pacquiao.

It was the last sparring session for Pacquiao,. who flies to San Antonio, Texas Sunday, just six days before he locks horns with unbeaten Jorge Solis at the Alamodome.

At 8 a.m. Pacquiao will hear mass at Christ the King, just five minutes away from his $5,000-a-month La Palazzo apartment unit, and will probably go for an early lunch in a nearby restaurant.

Pacquiao and his entourage, the size of a baseball team, will board a three-hour American Airlines flight to San Antonio at 2 p.m.

Pacquiao trained more than three weeks in Gen. Santos City and another three at the Hollywood gym. He’s logged close to 150 rounds of sparring, just about his normal routine heading for a fight.

In San Antonio, Pacquiao will no longer spar, according to one of his trainers, Nonoy Neri. Lined up until Thursday are light workouts in a gym to be provided by Top Rank. On the side, Pacquiao will watch the San Antonio Spurs vs the Portland Trail Blazers at the AT&T Center on Monday evening.

"I’m okay. I knew it since the day I sparred 12 rounds last week. The 12th round felt like the first round to me," said Pacquiao, as he finished a bowl of chicken soup Saturday.

There’s no problem with his weight, too. The last time he was asked, a few days ago, he stood at 134, just four more than the limit of 130 for super-featherweights.

"No problem with the weight," said Pacquiao as he put his right hand around his left wrist. "This is how I measure my weight. I can tell by just doing this."

And one luxury Pacquiao’s been enjoying is the fact that he need not undergo diet to make the weight. He still enjoys a plateful of rice with his favorite "tinola" or "bulalo" along with fried salmon and fruits.

"This is my third full meal for the day. I had one in the Thai restaurant, another with Jinkee outside Universal Studios, and this one," he told Pinoy scribes who visited him in his apartment.