I alternate on days that I have at home to workout with my bag, usually something like: Boxing A - 12 x 4 minute rounds, 1 minute rest in between each round, on bag Boxing B - short bursts of left/right on bag, then hooks, then body shots (all on bag), finish off with ab/neck work before each session I also do 10 mins shadow boxing. I do weightlifting/roadwork too now during the week, sparring at the club, but the above are my boxing sessions at home. Are these the best they can be? or is working the bag 12x4 pointless? thanks.
Where's your endurance drills? Burpees, jump roping, mule kicks. Incorporate more exercises into your workout and get some mitt work in.
That sounds pretty good but I'd look at doing less rounds at a higher intensity if you're an amateur boxer. For the 4 minutes do intervals of 20 seconds with 10 seconds rest, during the 20 seconds throw as many punches as you can and as hard as you can. You shouldn't be able to do too many rounds doing this. That's conditioning work for boxing, not skill work so make sure you do skill work still (preferably before). At least you're getting fit for boxing by boxing instead of getting fit for boxing by doing something else, specificity is the most important thing.
Yea, at least with me, if I ever tried doing 12 4-minute rounds I'll likely be coasting through all of it just trying to last all 12 rounds.
Looks good. Less rounds higher intensity. Bring in some pushups, plyo, squats and medicine ball into circuits. Run some hill if you can.
Alright Lefty hope your well mate, This for me is a bit of a sticking point. I would suggest that he would more likely benefit by using alternative methods to 'overload' certain aspects of his game- for example a round of burpee's is going to be far more challenging then punchinng a bag for his legs and CV fitness. A series of olympic lifts is likely to lead to greater development of body strength then punching the bag, and so on... Punching the bag obviously is an essential part of training but I do believe there are limits to the benefits and those seeking to get ahead of the pack need to look at methods outside of boxing to enable them to develop correctly. A bit like a sprinter. If all they did was sprint, then they likely wouldn't be as effective as if they did weights, overspeed training etc.. Thoughts?
Anyone who says this is good is not thinking straight- you've not even told us your training objective yet....
Hey mate I get what you're saying. However I stand by what I said, specificity is the most important thing. You can get two people training, one cycling and one running. Get them both up to the same level of fitness (VO2max, lactate threshold). They will both be far better at what they trained at, you put the runner on the bike and the cyclist on the track and they won't perform anywhere near as well as on what they trained. When your body adapts to training it learns where and what muscles it needs to shunt the blood to be as efficient as possible. Even when something seems similar there is still a difference, doing tricep extensions sitting down and lying down with the same resistance produces the same differences between two people, the one they trained at they are better at despite there seemingly being no difference. Things like weights, running are good as you get benefits in strength and endurance and there is always a carryover to a certain extent. However a far greater percentage of conditioning work needs to be done actually performing your sport to gain the peripheral muscle adaptations, train the neural pathways and get the blood flowing efficiently. Burpees can help with CV fitness and muscular endurance but any crossover gains to boxing are going to be minimal compared to what is gained from actual boxing fitness, even if your heart rate is higher while you're training doing burpees. Again olympic lifts will definitely help your explosive strength but whatever they can contribute to punching power is small compared to gains from actually punching. The threadstarter says he lifts weights, runs and spars as well so it sounds like he has his bases covered. I'm assuming the sessions he's asking about are for extra conditioning for boxing, intervals on a heavy bag are perfect for that. Intervals doing running would be great as well, but they wouldn't be as good for his boxing conditioning as actuak boxing would be. The only other thing I'd recommend to the TS that I didn't mention is to include plyometrics, preferably on it's own day but if not on the weight training day before he lifts. I'd argue that plyometric training is the most important supplement for any athlete. Top sprinters would still be top sprinters without those things, those things are to give them an edge and maximise their potential, the gains are small. Since I assumed that these sessions are for conditioning for boxing then I definitely think it should be spent on the bag or on the pads if he has that option. I agree that extra things should be done away from boxing to maximise their potential and gain an edge, but if any of that takes away from any sports specific work it's going to be detrimental in the big picture.
