By Ronnie Nathanielsz
Storm clouds have cleared and the sun has come out in Baguio City allowing Filipino boxing hero Manny Pacquiao to get back to business in preparation for his “Fire Power” showdown with WBO welterweight champion Miguel Cotto at the MGM Grand in Las Vegas on November 14.
Pacquiao’s conditioning expert Alex Ariza told us “the sun has been out the past two days and Manny was able to go jogging this morning and we are back on track.”
He said they had a slight setback because of the heavy rains brought about by back-to-back typhoons that inundated several areas of the country and left a swath of death and destruction considered the worst in the past four decades. As a result Pacquiao had to go swimming to try and compensate for the lack of roadwork.
However, with a break in the weather Ariza said its back to the regular routine for Pacquiao who will resume sparring on Tuesday.
The conditioning guru who turned Pacquiao into a more explosive fighter after he joined trainer Freddie Roach some weeks prior to the annihilation of David Diaz, Oscar De La Hoya and Ricky "Hitman" Hatton in his last three fights said Pacquiao “is looking good and is where Freddie (Roach) wants him to be at this point.”
At the same time Ariza said he hasn’t heard of any plans to leave earlier than October 24 for Los Angeles where Pacquiao will step up training at Roach’s Wild Card Gym in Los Angeles before taking the usual road trip to Las Vegas one week before the fight.
