Former WBC middleweight champion Julio Cesar Chavez Jr. is going through the training camp of his life, as he prepares for his all-Mexican grudge match with Saul “Canelo” Alvarez
Chavez Jr. will face Canelo on the most popular boxing weekend of the year, Cinco De Mayo, when they headline an HBO Pay-Per-View card on May 6th from the T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas.
For this contest, which takes place at a catch-weight of 164.5-pounds, Chavez Jr. will have to get down to his lowest weight since competing as a middleweight in 2012.
For this camp, Chavez Jr. retained the services of Hall of Fame trainer Nacho Beristain and conditioning coach Angel “Memo” Heredia.
The training camp has been taking place in the high elevation area of the Otom? Ceremonial Center in Mexico. Chavez Jr. has spent over 50 days in the location.
“We are already in the last stage of training, I’m happy for the work that we have done and I am anxious to fight, because the fight is getting close, the work was done and it continues to be maintained,” said Chavez Jr. told ESPN Deportes.
“The stay here is not pleasant, the weather is very irregular, cold, hail, sometimes the sun comes out – all of that will give me the strength for the moment when I get into the ring and logically the preparation that has been hard and it’s been different. Nacho has a certain style [of training] and I had to respect it.”
“I’m going to come in with 120 rounds of sparring for the fight. Nacho is very detailed, I’m boxing better, moving better, it’s going to be 120 rounds for the fight and I have not done that for a while, I have not done 12 rounds [of straight sparring] since 2012 – and I did them Saturday and I felt good.”
“It will be a night to remember, the styles, the personalities of both of us – it’s going to be a very good fight, something like Morales-Barrera. Canelo is a good fighter, he has shown many things but I do not think he has ever had a hard fight. He’s had difficult fights like the one with Mayweather, but he has not had tough opponents. He’s taken this fight lightly, he does not want to realize that he has a difficult fight in front of him. We will make things complicated for him and we will beat him. We are going to knock him out and not leave any doubts by leaving the outcome to the judges.”
