Boxing.
Wednesday’s workout was nearly all boxing. I was in a bad mood because my former employer had laid off more of my former colleagues, so hitting something was a nice distraction. I stood on a high stool while Trainer Jeff lifted the sandbag up to me. Hooks in place, big hook into the eyelet on the support beam. Then he wrapped up my hands. That was interesting, and I can’t imagine boxing without wrapped hands ever again. Except that it’s a big time commitment; you can’t just leap into a bit of boxing-for-fitness if you stop to wrap.
So there I was, hands wrapped, gloves on, staring at 150 pounds of sand in a body-sized cylinder. It’s amazing how different it feels to punch that instead of punching at the gloved hands of my trainer. When I punch at him, I aim for his hands, which are away from his body. When I punch at the bag, I need to aim directly into it, at a point a few inches inside the bag. Aim anywhere else and I could hurt myself. But I can’t hurt anybody else. I’m punching at a thing, not a person, and wow, this frees me to punch. I was finally doing what I was supposed to do and getting my whole body into it. Hips, shoulder, legs. Fist into bag.
When I got the rhythm right, the bag didn’t swing much at all. I found it disconcerting when it did, because that’s a pretty big pendulum with a lot of inertia. Left right, left right, try to keep my feet in the right places, try to keep my hands in front of my face. Man, there’s a lot to learn for boxing. I know nothing!
There’s a huge power difference between left and right punches. Even when I set up a left with a right, the left foot is forward and it changes things. Fascinating. Also, I completely don’t get how to do uppercuts yet, not really.
Two days later my shoulder muscles are still sore from this. I find that fascinating as well. It’s aerobically intense, and I knew that from before, but I guess I hadn’t ever really put muscle into it before. And I was not conscious of having done so at the time.
