It was Roach who asked Ariza to redistribute Khan's bodyweight down to the legs as stated in many of their interviews. So am sure Roach will be on top of things here
I don't think, that conditioning makes any difference in punch resistance, he improved his punch resistence with the help of good and strong sparring. He used to spar with feather fisted sparring partners overs here, and hardly got to hit with any punches.
Not at all. It's definitely his change in body shape/move up in weight. Without question. Sparring cannot improve your ability to take shot, you can't just get used to absorbing punishment.
plus khans body was too big for 135, like cotto he was dehydrating to make the weight, leaving less fluid in his body/brain.
After the Maidana fight many including myself gave Ariza props for his work to get Khan in shape. He made a point when first working with Khan of stripping down his top heavy build and making him more flexible then stiff like he was.
I think his legs can do with a bit more weight still, I also think his body is even growing out of 140 and that real soon he should move up in weight to 147. More weight to his still skinny legs should further improve his balance and punching power, and even help out his chin a little more. I think 147 will be Khan's most effective and best fighting weight for his frame, body, height.
I think he needs to stay at 140 for now. Nothing to do with weight really, more that the opposition at the same level is much tougher. The Maidana fight showed he has a long way to go in terms of technical discipline.
of course it can, although id say its a combination of things, improved s and c, move up in weight, better sparring and a greatly improved defence being the most influential factor imo
Roach instructed Ariza to work on Khan's legs. Ariza does get credit but any other decent S&C coach can do more or less the same thing. "I had a word with Alex, my strength coach, about Amir's body shape," said Roach. "We just thought he was too tight in the upper body and too light on the lower body and just sorted that out a little bit." Alex Ariza, Roach's conditioning coach, said: "I followed Freddie's lead that he wanted bigger legs and to take some of that mass from the top. He was just way too big. Unfortunately, we don't have a lot of time so we just focused on the lower body and on some core strength training and some explosive movement to just speed things up a bit."
I think it can. Ppl who spar are more likely to be able to hold a shot better than those that don't IMO
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Is this fight being shown on SBO in Ireland? Would be appreciated if someone could confirm that :good