By Ryan Burton

Heavyweight contender Andy Ruiz (29-1) hasn't fought since losing a majority decision to Joseph Parker last December.  The fight, which was for the vacant WBO title, was very close. The scores were 114-114 and 115-113 twice in favor of Parker.

The 28-year-old Ruiz has been out of the ring since that night but that is about to change.  Well known strength and conditioning coach Angel "Memo" Heredia has informed BoxingScene.com that he is now working with Ruiz and that he will return to the ring in Corpus Christi, Texas on the undercard of the Gilberto Ramirez-Habib Ahmed WBO super middleweight championship title fight.

"It is intriguing (to work with him) because of the fact that a lot of people don't realize that he has phenomenal speed. He is a guy who is almost 300 pounds and has the velocity of a guy at 147 or 154 pounds," Heredia said of Ruiz. "With him you have to keep working on his explosiveness. You also have to work on his endurance because I noticed in his last fight he was doing okay in New Zealand until his conditioning ran out in the last two rounds.  You have to maintain his explosiveness and strength but you also have to work on his mobility and endurance. His body eventually will change. It won't change in the first fight obviously.  Little by little and as we go it will get better."

Heredia is very confident that Ruiz will respond to the program he has installed for him.  He does however caution that it will take a few training camps before Ruiz is in the best condition possible.

"Me and Andy were talking about it and he wants to be a 245 pounder and he wants to reduce his weight to that to be a little more mobile. He wants to look a little more competitive body wise too. He was a little bit gordito but he was a phenomenon. There are certain habits he has to change. For example some eating habits - he has never lifted weights. Before, his management or the coaches he had before they didn't want any conditioners because they wanted to do it all. That is a big mistake because they want to expand themselves to positions where they don't know what the fuck they are doing. In this case he is willing to work hard and give everything he can so we will wait and see," Heredia told BoxingScene.com.

Ramirez-Habib will be televised by ESPN along with the Jerwin Ancajas-Israel Hernandez IBF super flyweight title bout.

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