by David P. Greisman
For some time, trainer Angel Garcia has said that it would be a gradual process as his son moves up from junior welterweight to welterweight.
Danny Garcia is the 140-pound champ, but his fight last year with Rod Salka had a weight limit of 142 pounds and his upcoming bout with Lamont Peterson has a contractual weight limit of 143 pounds.
Angel Garcia says a move all the way up to 147 is probably next.
“That’s what Danny wants to do. He wants to go up to welterweight,” Garcia told BoxingScene.com on April 9. “He been junior welterweight for eight years, since 2008, the USA Olympic Trials. He was ’40. And he’s still ’40. Discipline. That’s what tells you what kind of fighter he is.”
He was asked whether Danny is struggling more or needing to work harder to make the weight.
“It’s not about struggle, because at the end of the day you still got to do what you got to do. He knows his job,” Garcia said. “If he goes to 147, you still going to walk around 159, 160. You still got to drop the weight. It’s time to move on to bigger things in life. The 147 division is a perfect division right now where there’s more names as big as Danny.”
He wouldn’t mention which names. “Peterson is our name,” he said. “Saturday, April 11 we take care of that, and then it is what it is.”
Angel Garcia believes that they can retain Danny’s strength and speed as they keep more pounds on his frame
“It doesn’t change. You build it,” he said. “Danny’s strong already. He’s natural strong. You build the fat he’s going to gain into muscle. So basically he’ll be stronger. It’s not going to harm him, as long as you know what you’re doing. Some fighters go from 140 to 147, they don’t end up to be that fighter at 147 that they were at 140.”
Pick up a copy of David’s book, “Fighting Words: The Heart and Heartbreak of Boxing,” at http://bit.ly/fightingwordsamazon or internationally at http://bit.ly/fightingwordsworldwide . Send questions/comments via email at fightingwords1@gmail.com