(Photo credit: Esther Lin/Showtime) By Dan Ambrose: WBA junior middleweight champion Erislandy Lara (19-1-2, 12 KOs) was booed heavily by the pro-Canelo crowd in successfully weighing in at 155 pounds on Friday at the weigh-in at the MGM Grand in Las Vegas, Nevada for his fight on Saturday at a 155 pound catch-weight against former WBA/WBC junior middleweight champion Saul “Canelo” Alvarez (43-1-1, 31 KOs).
Lara looked almost in fighting weight and in excellent shape. He didn’t have the look of a fighter who had drained himself of water weight in order to make weight.
There was a quick stare down which was broken up by Lara, as he just shook his head in a way that suggested that Canelo doesn’t have what it takes to compete with him.
For his part, Canelo also made weight right at the limit at 155 pounds. However, in comparison to Lara, Canelo looked painfully thin for the weight, and it seems pretty obvious that he’s going to put on a lot of weight overnight when he rehydrates.
During Canelo’s interview with Showtime, he appeared to be breathing heavily and looking really dehydration. When a body loses a high percentage of water weight it causes major organs such as lungs to suffer. The blood becomes thicker and the person has to breath more rapidly to pump the blood. It was surprising that Canelo didn’t drink water during the interview because he didn’t seem alert and speech seemed slower than usual. It’s obviously not healthy to lose massive amounts of water weight in order to make weight and you can only wonder how much he lost.
Hopefully for Canelo’s sake he doesn’t suffer fatigue problems from the shifting of massive amounts of water weight in the 24 hours before the fight.
When a fighter takes off 20+ pounds over a week’s time, and then puts it back on in just one day, it’s really difficult on their cardiovascular system to add that much water weight.
It’s difficult for non-athletes to rehydrate that much in 24 hours, but for someone about to take part in an athletic event like Canelo will be doing, it might be tough on him once the fight goes past the 4th round.
Asked what he was thinking during the face off, Lara said he wanted to “Break his [Canelo] face in front everybody.”
Canelo said “We’re going to find out tomorrow who’s going to take who to school.” This was in reference to Lara saying that he’s going to take Canelo to Cuban school to show him how Cuban fighters box.
Office weights for the card:
Saul Alvarez 155 vs. Erislandy Lara 155
Abner Mares 126.5 vs. Jonathan Oquendo 126.5
Juanma Lopez 130 vs. Francisco Vargas 129
Johan Perez 140 vs. Mauricio Herrera 140
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