(OCT 13) Alejandra Oliveras peeled off a silk jacket to reveal her
singularly impressive torso, stepped onto the scales, and punched
the air in triumph as she made the weight, while her opponent, the
habitually sassy Anays Gutiérrez Carrillo of Colombia, who had come
in 600 grams over the limit (but later worked off the excess), stood
there glumly, her arms folded, like a wallflower at a ball, staring
blankly into space.
It was the weigh-in for tonight’s WBC world super bantamweight title
fight in Rosario – the first time the city has ever hosted such an
event (in which, incidentally, María del Carmen Potenza [4-4-1 (0
KOs)] will be fighting Bettina Garino [2-2-1 (1 KO)] on the
undercard) – and if their body language was telling us anything, it
was that the battle was already won.
The Argentinian journalists are in doubt of it: remembering her
triumph over Jackie Nava, which one described as the best female
fight he had ever seen, Pablo Mihal writes in today’s La Capital:
“On the 21st May, with a precise left cross [he means
‘hook’], Alejandra ‘La Locomotora’ Oliveras made Jackie Nava of
Mexico kiss the canvas of the Palenque del Hipódromo in
Tijuana. That – or rather the completion the count - marked the
beginning of her reign. But what no one knew, and renders her
stature even more gigantic, is that she’d been fighting the previous
few rounds with her [stronger] right hand broken – something of
which she’d breathed not a word to anyone.”
As though tonight’s project were already accomplished and the body
of the young Colombian – with its hint of puppy fat beneath the
shining, pale brown skin – a motionless heap on the floor, Oliveras
talked over her at the press conference, accepting readily the
invitation to perorate instead on her two favourite subjects:
Marcela Acuña (whom she despises) and Mike Tyson (whom she adores).
Referring to the former’s run on the current series of Bailando
por un sueño (the Argentinian equivalent of Dancing with the
Stars), she told reporters: “I’ll teach the Tigress to dance up
there in the ring; and afterwards I’ll give her classes in salsa and
merengue, because she’s a klutz!” There would be a settling of
accounts between herself and the Formosan, she promised, in March
next year.
But it was what she said about Mike Tyson that would be worrying me
the most if I were Anays’s mum: “It was his savagery that always
appealed to me. When he climbed into the ring, it was to kill; there
was never a smile. That’s what I liked about him. I think that’s
what most people liked, and why he was such a tremendous draw. He
could knock out anyone, with either hand – and leave the ring
afterwards as though that were nothing!”
Weights:
Alejandra Marina Oliveras (Jujuy, Argentina): 55 kg 300 g
Anays Cecilia Gutiérrez Carrillo (Barranquilla, Colombia): 55 kg 300
g
Cecilia Gutiérrez registered 55 kg 938 g the first time she mounted
the scales.
