Something about stepping up the cardio the last two weeks has really taken a toll on my knees. I used to do 30 minutes each day on the elliptical walker but the additional 10 minutes of treadmill has me walking around gingerly.

As of yesterday I’ve cut back to only elliptical walker. They kick me off the machine after 30 minutes so I’ll do an extra 10 minutes on a cycle. No treadmill until my knees get better.

This is what I did tonight:

• Rewatched my Title Boxing Counterpunching video
• Watched half of the Barrera/Marquez fight. I love Barerra, he’s probably my favorite fighter now that Mayweather has retired. If you haven’t seen his fight with Prince Naseem (which effectively retired the Prince), you should watch it on YouTube. Tonight I was studying how he would counterpunch Marquez’s lead hooks with a left hook to the body, I’m going to try that out.
• I iced my knees
• Did my shoulder rehab
• Took a hot bath and am about to get into an ice bath before bed.

 Hopefully my knees are better tomorrow, cause I’ll be up early and off to the gym.

Jack Dempsey would do rounds in a 5 foot cage, forcing him to box in a deep crouch. This drill builds leg strength and endurance and adds explosion to you punches.

I’m going to start doing rounds on the heavy bag in a deep crouch each weekend. I started last Saturday for a round. I’m curious to see how adding this to my weekly regiment improves my boxing.

I’m about to go to the gym. I’m planning:

• 40 mins of high intensity cardio
• Lift a little weights, mostly to keep my back feeling good
• Lunges
• Neck exercises
• I’ll do the 300 punch drill on the bag (throw 300 punches in a 3 min round)

Besides conditioning I’m also going to work on some things on the bag and shadow boxing. I’m going to spend at least a round working on each of the following:

• Circling right and shooting in for long jabs
• Rounds focusing on left hooks, especially to the body
• Rounds of uppercuts
• Pivots and bumps
• Do at least one round in a deep crouch
• Work on slips, bob & weave, rolls, covering & parrying while on the bag
• Rounds of V-slips while moving in all directions
• Rounds to simulate counter-punches, especially going over the top of a jab with my right, or catching a jab while throwing one and then following with a right, etc.
• During all of these rounds I’ll be using my mouthpiece to ensure I breath with it comfortably, ensuring I bend at my lead knee and I’ll consciously keep my eyes up where my opponent would be.

Weighed in today at 177 lbs. That means I lost 4 pounds last week. 177 is about what I weighed when I graduated high school!

I still have some “pudge” that I can work off. In my adult life I once got my waist down to 33″ when training for a Muay Thai fight (which never happened).  After a big breakfast I just measured my waist at 35″, so I still have weight to lose. I previously thought I could get to 175 in May, but I might even make 170.

Right now it looks like a June fight at 170.

I’ve been getting up early each day and doing my new high intensity 40 minutes of cardio in the morning. I’m not a morning person so for me to roll out of bed at 7:00 AM each day is a huge thing.

Tonight I got in 3 rounds of sparring with a new partner. He’s smaller and faster, but not a counterpuncher. I felt really good each and every round,  my punches were getting through, landed rights and body punches, my defenses were sound, I was counter punching, holding the center of the ring, cutting off the ring, etc. I even asked for a 4th round, but it was not in the cards.

I’ve been working on opening my hips and bending at the knee on my front leg more. This is helping my hook in both speed and power. I’m hoping to see it land more in sparring. I’ve also been studying my Title Boxing Counterpunching video and working on some counter punches.

Major breakthrough in sparring! My trainer has been a complete enigma, difficult to hit, effortlessly countering me, can’t see his punches, etc.  Apparently he’s kind of the gatekeeper for amateur boxers at our club, if you can do well against him you’re plenty ready.

Tonight I spent the entire 3 rounds circling away from his power hand and going for jabs. I was able to reach him with my jab consistently and other openings seemed to arise. I got in some straight rights and a number of hooks. I blasted in with some straight punch flurries in the first round. Hell, I might have even won the first round if we were being judged – hard to say from my viewpoint.

Second round was good, third round I sucked wind. My trainer was really nice not to try and kill me at the end. I also got my face marked up again: big ol’ bruise on the side of my nose. But hey, who cares when you’re making the kind of progress I am.

I got lots of kudos on my progress considering this was only my 20th round of sparring and considering the quality of my sparring partners. I feel like my confidence is back.

If you read my post the other day, you should know I discovered that I don’t “open up” my hips enough (or spread my legs) when I move to the left.

I got to experiment on the bag with this tonight. Opening up did wonders for my left hook and my mobility to the left. Without opening up my hips my knee points somewhat awkwardly inward, this causes some unwanted side effects:

1. I lose some of the movement from shifting my weight over my left leg and some of the leg induced explosion that I could be putting behind my left hook. This lack of leg action causes me to overcompensate by cocking or allowing my left hook to trail my shoulder when I rotate my body.

2. I feel more comfortable throwing combos then pushing off my left leg to either lean off or step off to the right. This is a big breakthrough because I tend to circle mostly to my left in sparring, which can be good for aggressive attacking, but somewhat poor for defensive boxing.

In L.A. when you stand someone up the generic excuse is, “I flaked.”  Well, I flaked last night, I didn’t do squat but eat too much pizza. Oh the shame!

Today I woke up bright and early, got work out of the way, and hit the gym. Did 40 minutes of cardio, lifted weights and did 3 rounds of shadow boxing and 7 rounds of bag work.

After the guilt of slacking yesterday subsided I decided I’m going to become a morning person and do my cardio right after I wake up. This is going to free me up to spend some more time in the evening watching film, working on my week points, and hopefully will allow me to go to class 3 times/week consistently.

I was really sore from yesterday. Upping the intensity on the treadmill and elliptical walker along with lifting weights did it’s toll on my legs. Unfortunately I only squeezed in 20+ minutes on the elliptical walker today. Later tonight I’m going to do some shoulder rehab and take an ice bath.

While watching the fights on Sat night it occurred to me why my footwork looks a little off when I rapidly step to the left. I don’t “open up” my hips (or spread my legs far enough) and as a result my knee bends slightly awkwardly and I don’t get my left leg out as fast as I’d like. I suspect the reason for this is a lack of flexibility.

I love it when I figure out something like this, it’s usually followed by a marked improvement in my boxing. You can never have too good of footwork or be too mobile in boxing. I’m excited to do some targeted stretching and to see how this impacts my mobility.

I enjoyed the fight. I’m still pissed off that the only sports bar nearby charged a $35 cover to get in to see the fight, but I was desperate.

Mayweather has better defenses than anyone in boxing today. Admittedly it takes an educated eye to appreciate him rolling off DLH’s punches, but the fact he could get in with DLH for 12 rounds and only eat 4 or so clean power shots is impressive.

Oscar looked great. Like everyone else I have to wonder what would have happened if he stuck with his jab. I would love to find out in a rematch.