"You know, the better conditioned you are, the better your boxing workouts are. Like I said, we have a great facility here at the Olympic training camp; they've been really good to us and we've just been killing it every day. We just go to the boxing gym at night, just to get loose, move around, and the hard work is done in the morning...we haven't even started real strength training yet. It's really just about getting the body in condition. I kind of mix in a little bit of track work with a little bit of stairs...If he can man up and get disciplined and give up stuff cold turkey, if he can give me that kind of discipline, I'll turn Manny into a machine again," stated world-class strength-and-conditioning Alex Ariza, who gave us an update on some of the early work he's doing with former jr. welterweight champion Amir Khan, as well as what he has planned for WBO welterweight champion Manny Pacquiao. Check it out!
BT: How's everything been going with Amir?
AA: Really good. We're training here at the Filipino Olympic training center; great track, great pool, so everything's going real good with him. We got him started and got him rolling. I think we'll be here for two weeks, so it's really going well with him. Everything out here is going well. I think it's always good getting started early just doing conditioning, especially for Amir, getting him in the mix and getting him going.
BT: I know Amir's not going to be sparring with Manny, but are they going to be doing their conditioning together, or are you guys going to do separate schedules?
AA: That's a good question, bro. I really haven't had a chance to sit down with Manny and talk over the game plan. I think Manny's been kind of caught up handling all of these tax issues and stuff.
BT: So what do you guys do over there in your down time? Do you just kind of chill and hang out at the hotel?
AA: Pretty much, bro. I mean, let's see, we start at 5:30 AM, because of the traffic, and then we go to the gym and then we come back here to the hotel and kind of sleep and rest until lunch time. Now, right here at the New World Hotel, it's connected to Greenbelt Shopping Center and it's 5 malls connected together. It's fucking humongous. During lunch time, we go and take a walk through the mall and stuff like that, kind of change it up a little bit, come back, rest, and then hit the gym at 4:00 PM.
BT: I always wondered that because every time they show you guys in the Philippines on 24/7, they always show footage of you guys out in the middle of nowhere surrounded by all these hills and dirt roads and stuff.
AA: Metropolitan Manila, dude, it's fucking beautiful. I mean, top line restaurants. You figure in the mall, you got Prada and Gucci and Louis Vuitton, all those fucking stores in there. Obviously, you know, that's the kind of people the mall is drawing over here. It's top notch and the mall is just amazing. It's just the best food I think I've ever had. From the kind of food that Amir eats all the way to the Italian, it's unbelievable the food here. It's really good. We went to an Italian place last night and they had some amazing pasta. It's just surprising, you know?
BT: Unfortunately, I don't know, but I'd love to find out. I'm going to have to figure out how I can work my way into someone's camp next time (laughing).
AA: I love it. It's nice, man. Dude, the nicest clubs, nicest lounges; you know, it's the city. You know, they always show the provinces, the little villages and stuff like that. They don't show the good shit where we have it.
BT: (Laughing) I see. I know Manny's just now getting geared up for his training, but has the media already bombarded you guys with questions about Bradley?
AA: You know, it's so funny. Of course the news people follow us around and they're like, "What do you think of Bradley saying this? What do you think of Bradley saying that?" Amir and Manny were just talking the other night and Amir's like, "Yeah, Bradley's so fucking big-mouthed now, but he pussed out when I was fucking trying to make the fight with him." He goes, "Now all of a sudden he's being tough with you. Now all of a sudden he's a tough guy after I told him to grow some balls right to his face. He didn't even have the balls to turn around and at least say, 'Hey, I'll fuckin' fight you any time.' He just put his head down and kept walking." He goes, "Who's going to fucking take his tough talk serious?"
BT: (Laughing) Yeah, that's gotta be a little irritating to Amir knowing how hard he tried himself to make the fight with Bradley.
AA: You know, that's why Amir said, when they saw each other at the Marquez weigh-in, you know, Amir went up to him and goes, "Hey bro, you need to grow some balls and step up." And Bradley just acted like he didn't hear him and just bee-lined in the other direction. So he goes, "Who the fuck is going to take his nonsense serious." He goes, "I've heard all that shit before." It's so funny, he goes, "He's the only one talking in the press. Nobody else is talking because he's gotta prove to people that he's a serious threat, because everybody knows that he pussed out against me. He didn't fight me, and yet he's going to be tough against Manny Pacquiao? Fucking, come on, give me a break." That's why when people ask him, he goes, "I don't even have a comment."
BT: (Laughing) Yeah, Bradley's been talking a little tough lately, saying Manny's starting camp early because he and Freddie know how much of a serious threat he is.
AA: They [Amir and Manny] talked about it when we were at the table for all of around 5 seconds. Manny was like, "Oh yeah? He's talking like that?" Amir was like, "Pfffft. He did all that shit when we were going to fight. Talk, talk, talk, talk, talk, and then when it came up, he pussed out. So I went right up to him and said, 'Hey bro, you gotta grow some balls,' and he just didn't make it happen. Now he's gonna be tough with you?" They just laughed about it and then started talking about something else.
BT: Has Amir been putting in a lot of work inside the ring even though Freddie's not there?
AA: For me, right now, the first two weeks for me with Amir is the most critical because it's all about getting conditioned. You know, the better conditioned you are, the better your boxing workouts are. Like I said, we have a great facility here at the Olympic training camp; they've been really good to us and we've just been killing it every day. We just go to the boxing gym at night, just to get loose, move around, and the hard work is done in the morning.
BT: What exactly do you guys do? Do you do plyometrics and stuff like that?
AA: No, we haven't even started real strength training yet. It's really just about getting the body in condition. I kind of mix in a little bit of track work with a little bit of stairs. Today we just did all pool work, because it is a full Olympic-sized swimming pool, so there's just so much shit you can do. There's just a bunch of shit you can do in there. We spent like an hour just in the pool today. I mean, he's shot; he's still asleep.
BT: Is Amir on a strict diet too like Manny?
AA: Even more so now because we had to cut some weight on the day of the weigh-in the last time. Amir was in the middle of his engagement when he was fighting Peterson, so there was a lot of stuff going on. I don't know if you know anything about the culture, but a Pakistani wedding, the engagement is a week long.
BT: Damn!
AA: Yeah, a whole week. But there's no excuses. On the weight issue, I've got a new system that I've been using with Chavez as far as getting him pre-fight to that weight without having him so bloated and stuff like that. I'm going to use that new system, just try to make the adjustments, and try to get Amir into carrying that kind of weight. I'm going to try to carry him in the 50's throughout this whole camp. Because of the heat hear, it's hard to keep the weight, so we're shooting up the calories, keeping the calories high and the workouts short and intense.
BT: So it sounds like he's not having a difficult time making the weight then. I was just wondering because I know before he was talking about maybe moving up to 147 some time soon.
AA: He may want to unify the titles, but honestly bro, he's not looking forward. He just wants to get in there with Peterson and make a statement. He's all about the new workout, he's all about the new diet, he's all about whatever it takes to get us to that next level. This time it's going to be a lot different. This time, I'm changing some things up for sure in the physical and conditioning part of it because I just think maybe Peterson came in a lot of heavier than I expected him to come in. He was a lot stronger than I expected, so now we gotta try to balance that out.
BT: Before I let you go, I wanted to ask you about all the changes that Manny has gone through recently. Obviously he's given up a lot of his vices and has become devoted to his bible study. Do you think that will have any kind of impact on his training or the way he fights?
AA: You never know. If he can man up and get disciplined and give up stuff cold turkey, if he can give me that kind of discipline, I'll turn Manny into a machine again.
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