By Ronnie Nathanielsz
WBO Asia Pacific bantamweight champion Rey “Boom Boom” Bautista is “training very hard” according to Filipino trainer Edito “Ala” Villamor who accompanied him to the US for his crucial battle with Mexican Gerardo Espinoza on December 23.
Villamor said Bautista was “having difficulty adjusting because the weather was very cold” but had braved the testing conditions to jog early morning and to work out in the gym which included sparring, in the afternoons.
In a day-to-day rundown Villamor said that last December 5, the day after their arrival in Los Angeles, Bautista sparred with WBO-NABO super flyweight champion Karen Harutyunyan for four rounds but was “quite sluggish due to jetlag.” They shifted to the Boxing 2000 gym in Orange County since trainer Freddie Roach left for Germany along with one of his boxers Ikeke Kingsley who fought there.
On December 7, Bautista sparred for four rounds with California lightweight champion Edgar Favian Vargas and was “very impressive” surprising the bigger Vargas who has a record of 9-2 with 1 KO according to boxrec.com. On December 9 Bautista sparred again, this time against super bantamweight Israel Nacarrete .Villamor said Bautista was once again “very impressive” and his sparring partner quit after three rounds.
A “tired” Bautista sparred only two rounds with former world-rated Art Simonyan who had fought Israel Vazquez for the IBF junior featherweight title. They returned to the Wild Card gym on December 12 where Bautista sparred with Mexican brothers Enrique and Daniel Cuevedo for three rounds each. Villamor reported that Bautista was “quite sluggish and slow-footed but still put up a good sparring.”
Villamor, in his report on the December 13 activities said Bautista did some light training with calesthenics and the speedball and was “still adjusting to the cold weather and homesickness.” Things turned around the following day as Bautista took on the Cuevedo brothers over eight rounds and was “in good condition and impressive.” Bautista is down to 121 pounds and said he is “expecting a very tough fight.”