By Mark Vester
Former middleweight champion Kelly Pavlik has entered training camp in much better shape than he did for April's decision loss to Sergio Martinez. For the Martinez fight, he started camp at 195-pounds and had to lose as much as four pounds on the day of the fight to make the middleweight limit of 160-pounds. He put on 18-pounds between the weigh-in and the actual fight.
Pavlik returns to action on the Manny Pacquiao-Antonio Margarito undercard on November 13 in Arlington, Texas. The opponent is veteran Daniel Edouard. This time Pavlik entered camp weighing less than 175-pounds.
“I didn’t get to 164 until the day of the weigh-in,” Pavlik said. “I had five hours to lose those last four pounds but I couldn’t go in the sauna. There was nothing to sweat [off],” Pavlik explained to Joe Scalzo of The Vindicator.
“I feel rested. I told everybody after the last fight that I was gonna take the summer off, take a break mentally and physically from the sport. Now I’m ready to go again.”
The fight with Edouard will be at a 164-pound catch-weight. Pavlik has about two months to lose 11 pounds. He expects to be very strong in the ring and wants to be impressive to put himself back in the running for major fights at middleweight.
“Four pounds [at 164] makes a huge difference, a huge, major, major difference,” said Pavlik. “Four pounds is a matter of a whole night and morning of still [having to work out] before a fight.”
“We don’t know what’s going to happen after this fight, how it’s going to unfold. Right now, it’s all about getting back in the ring, being impressive, taking [Edouard] out and seeing what fights are out there.”
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