There's a reason why boxing has been around for centuries as a form of exercise and self-defence - it works! So whether you're looking to lose weight, tone up, or get in better shape, boxing can help. But does that mean you have to sign up for a Boxing class at the gym? Not necessarily. You can easily do boxing exercises at home with just a few simple pieces of equipment. So what are you waiting for? Start fighting your way to fitness today!
Boxing FAQs
Smelling salts are often used on athletes (particularly boxers) who have been dazed or knocked unconscious to restore consciousness and mental alertness. Smelling salts are now banned in most boxing competitions.
The coagulant slows the bleeding while the Vaseline protects the affected area. Placing a dab of Vaseline inside a boxer's bloody nose can limit the amount of blood that runs, but repeated punches will often dislodge the Vaseline and cause the nose to continue bleeding.
A cutman applies grease and cold compresses to a boxer's face, ears, and eyes to forestall cutting and swelling during a fight. Decades ago, some fighters would actually have the cutman slice a severely swollen eye lid open so that the fighter could better see the opponent.
The idea is that immersing the body in freezing cold water speeds up recovery after exercise by reducing temperature, blood flow and inflammation in tissues of the muscles. Lots of us will have noticed that a bag of frozen peas does reduce the pain and swelling when you've pulled a muscle.
Weight Training
Building strong muscles in your upper body can give you the necessary strength to land hard punches. Much of the power in your punches comes from your shoulders and back, so do push-ups, pull-ups and shoulder presses to target these muscles.
Reasons Why Boxing Is The Perfect Workout For Weight Loss
Many people are beginning to turn to unconventional workout methodologies in a world with a growing sense of self-awareness and focus on personal health and fitness. It’s no longer just about hitting the traditional gym where you spend hours on a treadmill or lifting weights. Instead, one of the places more and more people are turning to for results is the boxing gym.
As a sport and as a martial art, Boxing has been around for centuries. People throughout history have practised it as a means of self-defence. But more recently, over the past decade or so, boxing has emerged as a popular workout.
People are drawn to boxing as a workout because it’s fun and promises drastic improvements to overall health and wellness. For those looking to lose weight and get fit, boxing is incredible.
Want to know how boxing can help get you into the best shape of your life? Check out these four points. Today, Evolve Daily shares four reasons why boxing is the perfect workout for weight loss.
It’s An Intense Cardio Workout
Everyone knows cardio is the way to go if you want to lose copious amounts of weight. But simply sweating it out on a treadmill can get super repetitive and boring. No one wants to spend hours just doing the same thing. While steady-state cardio can help you burn calories and shave off that excess weight, it’s very hard to keep up because it can get stale after a while.
Enter boxing, the ultimate cardio workout that will engage your upper and lower body.
Boxing trains cardiovascular strength and endurance more effectively than most of the workouts available today. It has the power to condition the human body into an energy-efficient machine. Take one look at the body of a professional boxer, and you’ll see an incredibly lean and cut athlete in prime condition.
The intensive and rigorous pad work exercises in boxing, followed by the constant fast-paced repetition of striking and punching techniques, are great for developing enhanced aerobic and anaerobic respiration.
It Engages The Whole Body
Contrary to popular belief, boxing isn’t just about punching. It’s so much more than that. There’s head movement and footwork, defensive techniques such as bobbing and weaving, and workouts to develop power and speed. But, more importantly, boxing is a full-body workout as it engages the entire upper and lower body.
Boxing workouts allow you to stimulate muscle fibres that you have never used before. This is why after training for a while, you will discover the strength and explosion you never had before. Most of the muscles used in boxing workouts are fast-twitch muscle fibres that are often neglected in traditional workouts.
Furthermore, boxing trains the most important muscle of all — the human heart.
After some training, the heart becomes much healthier, and the human body can regulate oxygen much more efficiently, resulting in better energy management. Good, quality cardio is also one of the key components in weight loss, and martial arts provides many opportunities to exercise the heart.
Burn Fat And Build Lean Muscle
Once you start leaning out and burning fat, boxing will show you your prime condition. Soon, you’ll have the body of a supremely conditioned athlete.
After a few sessions, you’ll begin to notice incredible weight loss. Each one-hour session in boxing can burn up to 1,000 calories. That’s a huge amount, and combining that with a proper diet, it can have a positive effect on your physique.
Of course, burning calories and melting fat aren’t complete without building lean muscle. Fortunately, the movements and techniques in boxing allow practitioners to build lean muscle and look extra cut and ripped.
Boxing can get you there if you’ve ever wanted those washboard abs and that well-defined chest and arms. Boxing is an intense workout that engages every part of your body. So you can be sure that you are targeting all areas you would like to improve aesthetically.
More importantly, boxing ultimately makes you a better athlete. Boxing is one of those sports that enhances every aspect of your physical capability, so many pro athletes cross-train in boxing.
Have Fun While You Work Out
Last but certainly not the least, and perhaps the most important, is that you will have loads of fun during boxing training.
Boxing and martial arts, in general, are the most fun you will ever have in a workout. And fun is one of the most important components of a fitness program. Working out becomes a chore if you’re not having fun with what you’re doing, and it’s harder to exercise.
Luckily, boxing engages not only the human body but also the mind. Learn the secrets of self-defence and understand the emotions and nuances of ‘The Sweet Science. It’s a mental exercise as much as it is a physical one, and it should keep you interested and engaged for as long as you practice it.
Why Training Like A Boxer Gets You In Amazing Shape
There are countless athletes, Olympians, celebrities, and weekend warriors who added boxing into their workout repertoire – and that’s not by chance or because it’s a trendy workout. Instead, it’s because boxing gets your body in amazing shape.
And here’s why…Boxing workouts use your entire body.
Does Boxing Build Muscle?
Absolutely! While most see boxing primarily as an upper body strength workout, there is no doubt that boxing is much more, and the benefits go far beyond building strong arms.
When engaging in a boxing fitness workout, proper boxing techniques require muscles throughout your entire body. It would help if you relied on your core strength, leg strength, balance, and endurance. From throwing across and ensuring a proper hip turn to slipping using your core and ducking using your legs, you have to use both large and small muscle groups all over the body.
Do Boxers Workout Their Legs?
Boxers have to use their legs to propel their punches. Boxing and boxing workouts require strong quads and calves. Ultimately, your power comes from the ground, and the only body parts touching the ground should be your feet. Your legs are connected to your feet, and much of the energy thrown in a punch has to come from the legs through a pivot or rotation.
When you’re in a boxer’s bounce, you are light on your feet and have to keep your weight on the balls of your feet. You use your calf muscles to move your body, make quick pivots to change angles, and use your leg power to maintain balance. Your boxing technique will have less force without strong legs, and your punch power will not reach its full potential.
Can Boxing Workouts Strengthen Your Core?
Ultimately, your core is the set of the back, hip, and abdominal muscles that hold your body together and serve as the central point that allows your muscles to work together. That’s why it’s referred to as your “core.” While your arms and legs have their power, your core is where that power is combined and pushed through in a strike or a powerful movement. Strengthening your core muscles helps with stability, balance, and control. Boxing drills that include defensive moves such as blocks, rolls, and slips all work your core as you move your entire body to simulate avoiding punches.
When you train like a boxer, you focus on strengthening your core, even when working off the bag. Exercises such as bicycle crunches, planks (and plank variations), and sit-up twist variations are all foundational movements in a boxer’s training regimen.
Do Boxers Have Strong Shoulders?
While a boxer’s arm is the delivery of the power, usually, a boxer’s shoulders will fatigue before their actual arm gets tired of punching. Since the shoulder muscles are a smaller muscle group and more challenging to strengthen, boxing workouts often include shoulder strengthening exercises that do not bulk the shoulder but instead create lean defined muscles. This muscle strength contributes to overall endurance and will allow your punches to maintain proper technique even as you gain strength.
Does Boxing Build Endurance?
Even though you don’t often see boxers running around the ring as if they’re training for a marathon, boxers must maintain a high level of cardiovascular fitness and withstand 4-12 rounds in “fight mode”. These rounds require you to use power and bursts of energy for striking and movement to take hits and avoid being hit.
In a boxing fitness workout, you have to keep your energy and movement throughout the entire round. These rounds can last two to three minutes with brief rest periods. As a result, you will quickly build your cardio strength and endurance. Eventually, you will work your way up to enduring 10-12 three-minute rounds, which will help you get into better shape. As your endurance improves, you will be able to work harder within the rounds and maintain your technique without premature muscle fatigue. Overall, this will elevate the level of your workout and continue pushing you to get stronger and increase punching accuracy.
Is Boxing Good For Cross-Training?
Because of the all-encompassing workout boxing provides, most athletes who train like boxers use the workout as cross-training to help them prepare for their primary sport. Almost all competitive athletes can benefit from the improved leg, core, and arm strength, more controlled movements, better reaction time, and learning to channel the body’s power into a strong burst of movement.
Although you may never get into a ring or have any desire to hit someone or be hit, using boxing drills and training techniques in your workouts can get your body into amazing shape. It allows you to strengthen and define some of the smaller muscle groups that work to transfer your power throughout your body and fuel your performance to help you reach your optimal training level.
Best Boxing Workouts
When you’re pressed for time in your fitness routine, boxing may offer a solution.
These heart-pumping activities not only burn a lot of calories and help you achieve the recommended 2.5 hours of aerobic exercise per week. You’ll also gain strength-training benefits, depending on your specific routine.
Boxing workouts can be done with or without a bag, and they can also incorporate free weights and other equipment.
Boxing routines are more than what you see on a televised match. While still based on martial arts-inspired movements, the variations in this exercise can offer challenges for all fitness levels.
Below are the best boxing workouts to consider incorporating into your exercise routine.
For Beginners
A basic boxing workout involves a combination of punches and kicks performed at a quick pace. But first, you have to learn these moves and get the hang of the proper techniques before picking up speed and endurance.
Some of the basic boxing movements to learn include:
- jabs
- crosses
- uppercuts
- hooks
- roundhouse kicks
- front kicks
- sidekicks
As you get these movements down, you can build your way up to combinations that will work your core with each twist, such as double hooks, jab cross intervals, and jab sidekicks.
With A Bag
Once you’ve got the basic boxing moves down, you might consider getting a bag for your home or perhaps joining a gym class that uses a variety of bags for punches and kicks.
Adding a bag or two to your boxing routine adds more resistance, helping your burn even more calories. You’ll strengthen your muscles, too.
For Weight Loss
With an estimated 350 to 450 calories burned per hour, cardio boxing can be a great addition to your weight loss plan.
Since it takes 3,500 calories to lose one pound, you need to burn 500 to 1,000 calories a day through diet and exercise to lose the recommended one to two pounds each week.
Doing boxing workouts a few times per week could help you achieve this goal.
If you’re carrying extra weight, you might be cautious about working out due to the excess pressure exercise can put on your knees.
Nevertheless, it’s still possible to get a good boxing workout in safely so you can lose weight and keep your workout low impact. This can involve lower kicks, slower jab-cross motions, and more.
For Cardio
The best boxing workouts that are cardio-focused typically come in high-intensity cardio kickboxing. You’ll learn the same basic boxing techniques, such as jabs and roundhouse kicks, but cardio routines tend to be faster-paced.
You may have a brief period of “active” resting in between circuits, but you’re expected to work your hardest when the circuit starts back up so that your heart rate stays at an intense level.
Cardio kickboxing may be offered with or without bags at a gym.
With Weights
Consider adding weights to your workout as you become more accustomed to your boxing routine and are ready for another challenge.
You can use light dumbbells for jabs and crosses. Other options include doing weighted exercises during active rest periods, such as squats with dumbbells, kettlebell swings, and basic bicep curls.
Boxing workouts with weights offer strength-building opportunities without doing a full separate workout from your cardio routine.
For Strength
For overall muscle and bone conditioning, the general recommendation for adults is to do strength-training routines two times a week or more. Aside from the use of weights in boxing routines, you can focus on bodyweight activities and heavier bags in your workout.
Punches and kicks on the bag are also more effective for building strength than in the air. The bag offers more resistance. Just be sure you use hand wraps to protect your wrists and to use proper-fitting boxing gloves.
A strengthening boxing workout can also incorporate bodyweight exercises, such as planks and pushups.
With Footwork
Boxing footwork entails constant movement during your movements and in between your circuits. Footwork is an exercise routine that builds agility and speed, which can help you in other activities outside of your workouts, such as walking and running.
Your basic stance in a boxing routine is in a “box” shape, which mimics what your stance would look like if you were in a real boxing ring. It’s also important to learn the basics of good boxing footwork to work your core muscles with every punch and kick instead of your back.
For a full breakdown of dos and don’ts in your boxing footwork.
Overall Benefits
Boxing means more than trying to punch or kick bags. Here’s a breakdown of some of the most notable benefits of regular exercise:
- improves cardiovascular (aerobic) health
- lowers your blood pressure
- improves the quality of sleep
- builds strength
- boosts energy
- helps strengthen bones
- helps alleviate stress and anxiety
- decreases depression symptoms
- helps you lose weight and maintain it
When To Talk With A Fitness Expert
Boxing can be an effective routine that can produce quick results, but it isn’t wise to jump into a high-intensity workout without getting down the basic moves first. You can find a wide variety of videos to watch at home that shows you the right way to do your kicks and punches.
Overextending your arms and legs can lead to injury. So you’ll also learn how to tighten your core muscles to protect your back properly.
Conclusion
Boxing is an amazing workout for weight loss and toning up. It’s a full-body workout that requires you to use multiple muscle groups at once, burning more calories. But what makes boxing so unique is that it’s also a mental workout. When you’re in the ring, you have to be focused and strategic if you want to win. This combination of physical and mental stimulation is what sets boxing apart from other workouts and why it can help get you in amazing shape. So if you’re looking for a challenging and exciting workout that will help you lose weight and tone up, try boxing!