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Sunday, May 06, 2001

By Chuck Finder, Post-Gazette Sports Writer

ERIE -- Paul Spadafora sucks eggs. Egg whites, to be precise. A dash of Tobasco, a wince, and he slurps down the pre-workout doses of protein. The International Boxing Federation lightweight champion of the world is sitting at a small, round, kitchen table in Thunderbird Motel Trailer No. 3 and growing increasingly tired of egg whites, training, the trailer, the five weeks of camp in this Bizzaro World (which we'll explain in a minute).

	Paul Spadafora works with co-trainer Tom Yankello Thursday at a small gym in Erie. (Gabor Degre, Post-Gazette)

He arises from the table and walks three steps to the open trailer front door -- air conditioning? -- and hands the rest of the egg whites to his running partner and 8-month-old pit bull terrier. "She's in great shape, man," he says of the pup he named Lefty, just to be different. Lefty slurps down the protein, then goes back to sitting on a trailer porch littered with laundry.

Two young guys have been living in this place for five weeks, co-trainer Tom Yankello and Spadafora, the former helping to prepare the latter for the McKees Rocks boxer's fifth title defense: Tuesday against Joel Perez at the I.C. Light Amphitheatre. One hundred twenty-five miles away from that South Side venue, in a trailer motel off 12th Street and in a two-garage-door gym behind a tuxedo and prom-gown shop at Peach and 56th, the gym where a red, white and blue message on the back wall reads: "Welcome to Bizzaro's Boxing Gym -- Gym of Champions," the IBF lightweight champion of the world is ready to get out of town.

"I'm never coming back here," Spadafora is saying Thursday, barely two days before he puts northwestern Pennsylvania in his rear-view mirror and returns to Pittsburgh for yesterday's pre-fight news conference. "I mean, I like the people up here. I'm only two hours away from home. My promoter [Mike Acri] is here. . . .

	A related article Spadafora's trainer leaves camp

"But I'm the champion of the world. Why should I stay here? If I am doing good, why do this?

"If I'm still the champ and I can afford it, I want to have every one of my camps in [Las] Vegas. If you want to be with the best, that's where you go. No matter what's down there, you're always thinking about boxing. It's better when you're constantly around fighters. You're not the only champ in the gym; there are 50.

"You've got to be reminded in this game. You can never stop learning. Shoot, I always want to have a little edge."

He trained in Las Vegas before making his first title defense in December 1999, and he found himself in a gym ring one day there sparring Floyd Mayweather Jr., whom he thumped. He trained in Fayetteville, N.C., before wresting the title from Israel "Pito" Cardona in August 1999 and defending it against mandatory No. 1 challenger Billy Irwin last December. He trained in his hometown of Pittsburgh a couple of other times and, well, there were too many distractions.

He trained in Erie this time because it was far enough away from home and close enough to Acri and manager Al McCauley, who commuted three times a week from Pittsburgh. Yankello could've predicted this Spadafora outburst about the camp. "This is Paul's angry week," he says. "The week before the fight, he's irritable. Tired of camp. Sick of sucking weight." Not to mention eggs.

Trailer No. 3 isn't a Vegas condo. Its 1970s furniture and 19-inch television screen aren't world-champ chic. This 12th Street isn't The Strip. Put it this way: It isn't beyond belief that Spadafora could be paying more each week to kennel his Doberman named Rocco than it costs for him to stay in this motel.

Spadafora tugs on a white muscle shirt, tennis shoes and a bowler straight from the Uncle Junior collection on "The Sopranos," and he heads out the open door for another workout. Yankello yells across the porch to Trailer No. 2 for training partner Jason Parillo, a Californian who shared that living space with co-trainer Jesse Reid, another Californian who is absent this past Thursday because he returned to the coast to attend to his ailing mother. Yankello, Parillo and Spadafora pile into Yankello's Chevrolet for the 10-minute trip, stoplights included.

Peach Street isn't a place where you'd expect to find a boxing champion of the world, amid the Millcreek Mall and the car dealerships. But here he is, behind the tux and gown shop, behind the two garage doors, in a gym graciously loaned to the Spadafora camp by a notable Erie boxing family. The walls of the gym are lined with posters and newspaper pages chronicling the boxing careers of Bizzaros.

The gym also contains two heavy bags, two small bags, two speed bags attached to walls, a mirror, a ring with a new, blue canvas, two folding chairs, a bench, a vacuum, a mop and bucket, and a pink Princess phone that rings continuously. If you want privacy -- amid the din of Spadafora skipping rope or punching Yankello's hand pads or round clock buzzer or the stereo playing DMX -- you stretch the extra-long phone chord and take your call in the restroom.

"For a boxer, this is the worst time," Spadafora is saying to no one in particular. "Four, five days before a fight." He is anxious. He is eager.

His weight, formerly a problem with its wild fluctuations and last-minute cutdowns, hovers around 134 pounds after these workouts. That's only one pound from his necessary weigh-in weight tomorrow. He plans to "cool back" his training after this past Thursday, when he spars in the morning (away from prying eyes) and works out in the afternoon in front of Acri, McCauley, cutman Spacky Dileo, a reporter, a photographer and a former pro boxer from Erie.

In the end, Spadafora looks at the elder Dileo and is reminded of his original trainer and father figure, the late P.K. Pecora. McCauley and Dileo go back with Spadafora to those Pecora times. They all laugh.

"I'd say, 'Peek, you think I'm ready for this fight?' " Spadafora recalls.

"And," McCauley picks up the story, "he'd always say, '[invective], I'm going to have to call off this fight.' "

The Perez fight is still on.

Spadafora is out of Erie.

The champion of the world who wears P.K. on his shorts -- for both Pittsburgh Kid and Pecora's initials -- thinks he's ready.

"You know what?" he concludes of this spartan Spadafora camp. "It does the job. It does the job.

"That's the only thing we're here to do."