All Around The Boxing Bags

The boxing gym has two classes: kickboxing and boxing. I thought that I would try the boxing without the kick or so I thought. The kick was actually the beatdown that Chris administered.

Chris is reserved so there was no fanfare just quiet commands.

You know how they say that a cheap person squeezes a quarter so hard that they're capable of making the eagle scream? Well, Chris squeezed but it had nothing to do with frugality. Everyone looked absolutely used up at the end of class; I was already exhausted during the warm-up. I don't even remember the myriad calisthenics that Chris threw at us.

He had us run around the perimeter of the bags to warm up. If someone ran slower than you (not a problem that I had), you could just dart between the bags and go around.

We used a medicine ball for lunges, for squeezing them between our legs as we went into a squat position on the wall and for push-ups. During the warm-up, we rapidly tapped our toes on the medicine ball. So, never underestimate the ways that a medicine ball can be used during your workout.

We did combinations like jab jab + a low body shot to the left then right + right and left head shots. Typically when we did a combination, Chris had us drop to the floor and do, say, four bear crawls frontward then backward then drop and do push-ups. It was crazy.

I really looked at him hard when he wanted us to do a long jump. He demonstrated and looked like he was channeling Al Joyner or something...

In between jabbing and crossing, we did mountain climbers, jumping jacks, squats etc.

I did like it when we went to the front of the room and hit every bag for six punches. Once you got to the end of the row, you had to run back to the front of the room and repeat. Then, we ran around the boxing bags again and Chris would yell out for us to find a bag...jab jab...run...find a bag...jab jab...run.

And just when you thought you couldn't take it anymore, Chris came around to give personal attention with his punch mitts and you had to jabjabjab on his countdown.

We ran with a medicine ball and we did the most tortuous ab work. What is it with these people and circus-like moves for the ab? Probably the "easiest" ab work that we did involved wrapping our legs around the bottom of the bag, leaning back and extending our arms out to the side. For the record, Chris was unrelenting for exactly one hour...

Yesterday, I thought that I smelled something while I was at the gym. Wasn't sure what it was but now I know why some folks have their own boxing gloves. The ones at the gym smell awful.

Random fact: the classes have been comprised of all women so far.

Also, there was this woman in class today and, if she were fighting, I would definitely put my money on her...