There’ll be very little excess baggage on hand when superstar Manny Pacquiao reports for training at the Wild Card Gym in Los Angeles sometime next week.
“Mas-payat ako ngayon (I’m thinner this time),” Pacquiao claimed over the phone yesterday, adding that he has stayed in shape playing basketball as often as he can.
“I like sweating it out on the basketball court. So when I arrive in the US, I can begin training any day. I don’t want to wait until the first day of August,” he added.
Pacquiao’s trainer, Freddie Roach, wants him at the Hollywood gym the first day of August or two months before the Oct. 6 rematch with Marco Antonio Barrera.
“But if he wants, I can start training on Monday,” said Pacquiao. He has not checked the scales recently but said he should be weighing more or less 140 lbs.
The fight against Barrera, set at Mandalay Bay in Las Vegas, will be pegged at 130 lbs. Co-promoters Top Rank and Golden Boy are working on the fight details.
“There’s nothing yet regarding the fight contract or the fight purse,” added the flamboyant boxer, who last fought on April 14, beating Jorge Solis in San Antonio, Texas.
He is set to leave for the US tonight, according to his chief of staff Jake Joson. Expected to join him are trainers Buboy Fernandez and Nonoy Neri, and lawyer Geng Gacal.
On Wednesday, he and Barrera will come face to face in a press conference, the first of a series of promotional gigs that should further drum up the anticipated rematch.
