That was my amateur background. I fought about 55 fights and took a year off before deciding I wanted to try and make a living at boxing.

Manny has fought Marco Antonio Barrera, Juan Manuel Marquez and Erik Morales in his last (four) fights. He's been in tough fight after tough fight, he's been taking on the best fighters of the era and I don't believe that a fighter needs to be a life-and-death fight every time. In this case Manny's coming off a real war with Morales and this is a tune-up fight for the next war with Morales.

When I decided to give boxing all my focus, this is the reason I did it. I'm more ready for this than anything I've done in my life. Anybody can spend their entire career in the shallow end of the pool but I decided I want to get in the deep end.

I used to box a bit, and once fought as an amateur welterweight.

The question is, what took so long?

I have a background in erotic dancing, but that's mostly just - it's not professional, it's just amateur.