By John F. McKenna (McJack): World Boxing Council (WBC) middleweight champion Julio Cesar Chavez Jr. (48-0-1, 32 KO’s) is set to defend his WBC title belt against Ring middleweight champion Sergio Martinez (49-2-2, 28 KO’s) on Saturday night and as recently as Monday he was still twelve pounds over the middleweight weight limit of 160 pounds.

Chavez and Martinez will clash at the Thomas & Mack Center in Las Vegas. The match will be broadcast by HBO and will be a Pay Per View (PPV) event.

It is no secret that Chavez has struggled to make weight in the recent past. So the logical question among boxing pundits who dissect every move a fighter makes during fight week is will Julio be able to get down to the middleweight limit in time for his big fight with Martinez.

Even Chavez’s five time trainer of the year Freddie Roach acknowledges that it will not be as easy task for him to make the 160 pound limit by the time of the Friday weigh in. Normally after the weigh in the 6’1” Julio rehydrates back up to about 180 pounds in the 24 hours before the fight. In essence Chavez may have as much as a 20 pound weight advantage over Sergio by the time the bell rings on Saturday night. Martinez normally comes in at around 155 pounds, which is his normal walk around weight between fights.

The reality is that Julio has been able to use his size advantage to overpower and bowl over his opponents in recent fights. Julio’s ability to take off weight and drop down to the middleweight limit has worked very well for him. Some would argue that that it is a tactic which gives Chavez an unfair advantage. His most recent opponent last June, Andy Lee (28-2, 20 KO’s) was thought to be a good test for Julio, but it quickly became evident that Andy could not cope with the size advantage Chavez enjoyed. Lee wound up being TKO’d by Chavez in the 7th round.

There are some boxing pundits who believe that the degree of difficulty Chavez has in making the weight for the Martinez fight will have a direct bearing on whether or not he is successful. Many boxing observers also feel that WBC/Ring light heavyweight champion Chad Dawson (31-2, 17 KO’s) lost to WBC/Ring super middleweight champion Andre Ward (26-0, 14 KO’s) partly because he was weight drained and had no energy.

Julio Chavez Jr. has most assuredly come a long way in the last year, but it will be a huge mountain indeed he will be attempting to climb on Saturday night. Boxing pundits and fans alike will be interested to see how much difficulty he has in making the middleweight limit.