The all things technical thread.

Slip, I know many boxers like to wear wraps when hitting the bag, but to be honest I never understood this. Surely the gloves have enough padding to protect your hands. I don't know, I might be wrong, but my old boxing coach never liked us wearing pads when hitting the bag. He said that we should hit the bags without gloves in order to "condition" the hands. Now I'm not sure on this "conditioning the hands" business, but I've always felt that a bag is not really solid enough to hurt the hands if you're wearing gloves. Like I said though, obviously I'm no expert so it would be good to hear from fighters and trainers to see what they think about this.

While we're on that subject, I did something a lot more stupid than hitting the bag with no wraps. When I was younger I trained in kung fu. Now I don't know if you've seen this documentary on Shaolin monks and their training methods, but on this documentary they showed the monks "toughening" their hands by hitting many layers of paper that were stuck to a brick wall. When their hands became tougher they would remove a layer, untill they were pretty much hitting a brick wall. Being young and dumb, I took half the pages off a newspaper, stuck them to a brick wall and tried to replicate their training methods. I did this each day, for about 30 minutes (or untill my skin ripped and I had to stop early. I carried this on for about 3 months after which I figured out I needed to go out and get laid, instead of being some weirdo who punces a wallatsch It's a wonder my hands are still in one piece and I was still able to do boxing after. patsch

 

wraps should be worn all the time and bags can do damage if wraps are not on properly or not on at all

 

I have a question.

Why do coaches use choreographed routines on the pads? For example, my coach used to ask me to throw a left jab, straight right, then he would throw a left hook and ask me to duck. So it was, jab, straight, duck, jab, straight, duck, etc.

Obviously in an actual fight you will have no idea when the guy will throw a hook so it will be a lot more difficult to avoid it. Surely it's way too easy to duck under a hook when you know it's coming. Surely it would be better if he just threw shots randomly instead of a pre-defined pattern, no?

Now what would happen is that when I was the one holding the pads for other fighters, I noticed a really bad habit among them. Sometimes I would **** with them and NOT throw the hook at them, but because they were so used to this pattern, they would duck regardless. Other times they would duck way to early, before I even threw the hook. They were just going through the motions and were not really ducking to avoid a hook. They were ducking because it was basically part of a choreographed dance routine. That's the way I saw it anyway.

I had to really watch myself to make sure I wasn't doing the same thing. That I was actually doing the movement in order to avoid a punch, and not because it is part of the pre-defined pattern. Of course it was difficult, and often when other fighters were holding the pads for me and also changed up their rhythm suddenly, I had the same habits. Because I was so used to "left, right, duck", that's what I found myself doing even when the pad man did not throw a hook and there was nothing TO duck.


I mean, I'm sure choreographed routines have their uses, because otherwise so many coaches would not be doing it, BUT shouldn't there also be a bigger focus on the randomness and chaos of it all? So that you don't really become trapped in a certain rhythm which could **** you up. I don't know if I'm making sense here. You know what I mean right?


Another thing I see (not just from when I was training) but from world class coaches, is that when they do the pad work and throw hooks, they throw really half-hearted, slow ones. I never understood this either since in an actual fight the opponent will be trying to take your head off so surely the pad man should replicate this?

 

apologiues but looking at a boxercise class for evidence isnt gpoing to convince me!

 

No, but the principle is generally the same.

You are being asked to do X, Y and Z. Just because the person holding the mitts are better (generally) and the person with the gloves is better doesn't mean that it can't enter a person's mindset.

I think mitts can be used well for warm ups, warm downs etc but I wouldn't use them as part of training a fighter as such. I'd look more at observations of them shadow boxing or hitting the bags, and obviously sparring.

You can't really take the time to consider how well a fighter is doing when you are almost training with them, especially their foot movement.

Ricky Hatton once said that the best part of their training was that they made the routine as close as possible to a fight. A fatty or non boxer holding the mitts can't control range in the way that an opponent would tend to do for starters, plus you don't throw a jab above someone's shoulder at a stationary target.

The routines have their uses, but I wouldn't over do it personally.

 

good post and you raise some interesting points.

i believe that some choreographed is good and some random is good. the benefit of choreographed is you drill repeatedly a set movement until you are throwing it quickly, smoothly, technically perfect and with power. i think that this should be your bread and butter so to speak so the things you will throw a lot of eg a 1-2 or a 1-2-3

i also think choreographed has its place as long as it is high percentage ie it mimics something which happens in the ring frequently. so a choreographed routine of someone throwing a 8 punch combination is pointless imo. however a choreographed defending a 1-2 by catching the jab, blocking the right and then countering with your own right hand and left hook is something which should happen a lot in sparring and a fight.

the benefoits of choreographed too is it builds the base level of skill until the boxer gets good. until a oxer gets to a decent level there is no point in doing random combois as the boxer wont get any benefit from it and will take too long to react.

i think padwork should be 2 or 3 punches max, then you have to deal with a punch or reset yourself to throw another combo. eg throw your 1-2 then slip a jab and throw a 2-3 before stepping to the side.

padwork also shouldnt involve too much slapping by the pad man, the pads should be kept close together and replicate someones head. not 2 foot apart. and the padman should move too. no boxer will stand there as they get hit 3 times. so a good padman will make you use your feeet too and thriw punches whilst you move

 

Beeston and no****inchance: ace posts.

Beeston, really agree with observation; old school trainers much preferred watching their man on the bag to see what mistakes they were making.

 

I'm just at work but i'll fetch my opinion later- good read guys

 

hadnt thought of that aspect of hitting the bag. very true.

 

I like the little bit of mitt work that Hagler is doing here with Goody....

[ame]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=grVrB_WULpI[/ame]


Working on a move that they obviously think can work in the fight, then practising it.

It kinda gives me the opinion that trainers can sometimes work better when in pairs, doing a bit of video analysis on the opponent, one critiquing their strengths and the other their weaknesses, and then splitting the duties between them.

I can't think of which episode of 24/7 it was, but in the Marquez/Pacquiao series there was a short segment of Nacho just watching young kids shadowbox whilst moving around in a big circle.

That way you are getting the best out of your time by being able to watch everybody, rather than people taking turns to have their time with the trainer and spend the rest of the time tossing it off.

 

Regarding pad work there are different uses. I use the pads to work on movement and correct technique- but there are some problems. Firstly the pads are a great CV work out but a one two is usually aimed at two different targets. This is incorrect obviously- most people only have one head. Your feet should be positioned in relation to the target so tow targets = two different foot positions.

You see a lot of mongo trainers who hold the pads way too far apart.

So whilst the pads can replicate some aspects of 'real' boxing - they certainly aren't the be all and end all. All I used to do in my first career was pads- I did literally one pad session in 5-6 weeks training for my last fight and thats was arguably the most complete performance of my career.

Manny's video is tremedous and thats what I like to think I use the pads for too - corrective and demonstrative. The problem with novice pad man is that they don't realise that they are looking at a 2d representation of the fighter - they are not looking at important things such as anterior and prosterior balance.

Also often if there is too much padwork a novice fighter can become a little clueless when presented with the opportunity to create their own combinations. Too often I see pad man fiting out these vast combinations with seemingly little understanding of the hows and whys... or the just stand there like a big heavybag- I would post a video of some **** padwork but last time I did this I ended up in a rather annoying argument with a very clueless person/pretend coach.

I've worked with some really good pad man Kevin Maree, Louis Veitch, Howard Rainey, Alan Lavene, Johnny Eames and Tony Moran are all really good on the pads. I've also seen Billy Nelson, Anthony Farnell and Oliver Harrison in the flesh and all three are really good.

Mayweather pad drills and repetition drills do have a place but they are not reflective of 'real' boxing nor should they be used for that purpose. This is the whole point about **** trainers. They don't understand what things are for.... pad drills like the mayweather drills are great for ingraining responsive movements and helping with balance. For example the opponent attempts a left hook to the body and you block and responsively counter with the right uppercut - a shot that they cannot block if executed correctly.

Pads can also be awfully detremental to a boxers technique if done badly. You can coach poor form and poor technique just as easily as good form and good technique. The secret is watch the boxer not the pad man- if the pad man looks great and the boxer looks **** then more often then not there is an issue.

Any question? I'll give my opinion on if you like....

 

Great posts here lads :good

Enjoy this.
[ame]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BB2BAfu7Jmc&feature=related[/ame]

Shame watched it all, thought it would be more training then that. Started off with stance/posture then just got silly..

 

The music in that gym is top notch:good

 

:good Yeah agreed, had to laugh at how vain Haye is in background looking at himself in mirror.