By Miguel Rivera
WBC middleweight champion Saul 'Canelo' Alvarez (46-1-1, 32KOs) is about to finish up his first week of camp in San Diego, California.
Canelo will return to the ring on May 7th at the T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas. He will defend his world title against former junior welterweight champion Amir Khna (31-3, 19KOs). The fight takes place at catch-weight of 155-pounds.
The team is already ready to start sparring sessions. There is going to be a total of four sparring partners and there should be a max of 110 rounds of sparring in the gym.
"Starting next week we are going to being working with the sparring partners and we have seven weeks to spar. We'll close with about 110 rounds. At this stage we don't need anymore than that," said José 'Chepo' Reynoso, manager and co-trainer of Canelo, to ESPN Deportes.
"He's looking great in the gym, everything is going well.We are now waiting to assess one more boy [for sparring] but we already have three and with those four we are going to get the right work. They are talented guys who have the ability to do the things that one asks and they demand a lot from Canelo [during sparring sessions]."
Chepo has been reading some of the comments from Khan, who says Floyd Mayweather Jr. showed him the blueprint on what needs to be done in order to beat Canelo. Mayweather handed Canelo his only loss, with a dominating decision, back in September of 2013. Canelo has won four straight.
"If you look, during every conference the scenario is the same. All of the opponents have a lot of confidence. Alfonso Gómez composed a rap. James Kirkland and Erislandy Lara [made boasts on what they were going to do], but at the end of the night they all realized that they were wrong," Chepo said.
"There is only one Mayweather. There were many times when I wanted to sing like Pavarotti, but I could never reach that voice. A lot of people want to be like Mayweather just like I want to be Pavarotti."