After what can only be described as an excellent training camp in Baguio City for WBA light welterweight super champion Amir Khan and WBO welterweight champion and pound for pound king Manny Pacquiao, the two went their separate ways this week, heading for Manchester and Los Angeles respectively.
The former is in training for his April 16th bout with Paul McCloskey at the Manchester Evening News Arena in England while the latter trains for his May 7th showdown with veteran Shane Mosley at the MGM grand in Las Vegas.
Unlike their last few fights before which they worked closely together, Khan and Pacquiao who share a trainer in Freddie Roach, were largely on separate schedules this time around, mainly due to the fact that they were constantly in different phases in their training.
While a lot was made of the fact that Khan and Pacquiao sparred against each other in the past, this time around the two champions did not spar, and were in the gym at the same time only in passing.
Khan said to fans ahead of leaving the Philippines:
“Flying back to the UK now, cant wait to come home, I land on Sunday which is also mothers day, cant wait to see my family and my new niece”
Khan is also set to appear on popular BBC sports based quiz show “A Question of Sport” tonight, and according to his regular twitter comments and interviews is in better shape now than ever, thanks he says to a new diet and different strength and conditioning program.
McCloskey will be Khan’s first fight with new strength and conditioning coach Michael Vale after he parted ways with former coach Alex Ariza in February over what appeared to be a financial dispute. Advertisement
The two sides differ in their opinions of what lead to the split, but with Ariza still working with Pacquiao and Julio Cesar Chavez, both of whom like Khan are trained by Freddie Roach, there appears to have been contact between him and Khan without incident.
Fans will be eager to see what difference if any this change will have made to Khan, who attributed his December victory over hard punching Marcos Maidana last year to Ariza’s program.
Manny Pacquiao meanwhile landed in Los Angeles over the weekend to begin training at the Wild Card Gym, and once again avoided the waiting media scrum by taking an alternate route out of the airport.
He won’t be keeping a low profile for long however, with U.S television appearances being lined up as well as the screening of Fight Camp 360 on CBS, the first episode of which aired on Saturday night.
Alan Breton, Pitt: “Pacquiao and Khan both benefit when they train together because they both push each other harder, I guess the Ariza split thing makes that difficult now though”
Ali Fowler, Bolton: “Amir looks the same with Vale as he did with Ariza, we’ll have to see on fight night if he’s any different”
