Nerdcore Boxing

Since I’m planning on doing a series of boxing tips I wanted to clarify that this blog focuses on tips for fighting experienced boxers. Without this clarification there will be some new boxing students sitting at home saying things like, “I always push the bag and I never have trouble landing power punches against my friends.”

Four Types of Boxers 

In boxing training you’re going to step into the ring with one of 4 types of people:

The Boxer - This guy has learned the sweet science, he’s in shape, he’s fluid, he’s mobile and he’s elusive. This guy knows tricks that will shock you and make you feel clueless. And unfortunately he can hit hard.

The Slugger - This guy may have been around or some time but for some reason hasn’t really learned the sweet science. Maybe he doesn’t care to, maybe he thinks he doesn’t have to listen to his trainer, or maybe he just relies on his natural power too much. See further info in my post Brawlers vs Boxers.

The Amazing Athlete - Boxing requires endurance, speed, power, fluidity, balance and refined footwork. Some rare individuals have athletic backgrounds where these are already highly developed and pick up boxing unusually fast. I hate these guys (sorry, that’s jealousy talking).

The Untrained - This guy may never have thrown a punch before, or he may have come from a martial arts background, or he may have had lots of street fights. But when in the ring, he doesn’t know squat compared to the Boxer.

Of course there are different degrees of Boxers, Sluggers and many levels of cluelessness in the Untrained, but this is a good categorization.

Difference Between the Read Deal and the Rest 

A person with decent boxing skills should be able to land a variety of punches against the Untrained. He may be in constant danger with the Slugger, but he should be able to land punches when he’s not weathering the storm. The Athlete is unpredictable, it depends how gifted he is. The Boxer is a whole other animal. Against the Boxer you might not even be able to land a single clean jab for many rounds when you first spar.

If you want to develop you should spar with the Boxer. That’s where you’ll learn the most and that’s were you’ll learn what you know and what you don’t know. If you can never land a left hook against the Boxer, you can’t properly throw it. If you can land it, then the Untrained, the Slugger and the Athlete will be easy pickings for your left hook.

Don’t be confused, the boxing tips and techniques on this blog are to help you in sparring the Boxer.

I bet before the yuppie boxing and girl boxing days, a very high percentage of boxing students sparred. I bet it used to be common for trainers to pressure people to spar. Today lots of students don’t spar and I rarely see trainers put any pressure on beginners to spar.

In my opinion everyone should spar and at least to get a taste of real boxing. You won’t appreciate what boxing is really about until you spar. There’s a lot more than making a punch look good in the mirror. There’s defense, knowing when you’re safe, where to put your head. There’s what punch to throw, when, at what angle, and against which kind of fighter. Hell, 80% of boxing can probably only be learned inside the ring.

You can have a lot of fun “cardio boxing,” get in great shape and add a little adventure to life just by stepping into a boxing gym. But no matter how much effort you spend on your skills you won’t know if you’re doing it right until you can do it against a quality opponent.

If you ever get the attitude that you’re better than the other guy because you’re faster, you have a better jab, or because you use angles, then you won’t be better for long.

I have a number of skilled and hard working sparring partners. Their skills, weapons, styles and attributes are constantly changing. If I slack off, inferior boxers catch up to me. If I miss training, I lose my ability to hang with better boxers.

The only way to stay a better boxer than Jimmy is to continually work harder than Jimmy.

I’m a big fan of these variations to traditional shadowboxing. Try them out, I hope you like them.

Wear Sparring Gloves

Have you ever felt frustrated that your seemingly well drilled punches, footwork and balance went to crap when sparring? Join the club. There are probably a lot of reasons for this. One reason could be the sparring gloves affecting your balance.

Try wearing sparring gloves during shadowboxing. You might suddenly notice that the weight of sparring gloves is just enough to throw off your balance, structure and punch “snappiness.” This is especially true when you miss. Keep drilling until you get your balance back.

Wear Headgear Too

Does the tight defensive structure you worked on suddenly open up?

Try shadow boxing with headgear. Headgear sticks out and makes it awkward to rest your glove on your face. This can really throw off your defenses. Drill until you get over this.

Shadowbox Blind & Naked

Not really naked, but without gloves and a mirror. When your watch yourself in the mirror you’ll notice the punches flying at the mirror and have your attention on a number of areas.

When you go blind and naked, you’re looking through your guard at nothing. You’ll feel wide open as if there are huge holes in your defenses. It creates a natural urge to pull your elbows in tight and keep your hands up. Try a few rounds this way.

At the end of my grueling boxing class I’ve been sparring 3-4 rounds. The problem is my boxing club requires you to do 5 rounds before you can represent them in competition (note amateur competitions are usually 3 rounds, but we over-prepare).

I’ve been working at getting my “sparring endurance” up, but it’s been a real chore. A few months ago somebody told me to do 40 minutes of cardio, which just didn’t work.

I’ve recently been focusing on 3 areas and have started to see some success:

1. Extra Jump Rope - If you think about it, the two major activities in the ring are punching and making small fast steps. Jump rope works on the latter. I’ve been jumping for 20 minutes straight while moving in different directions.
2. High Intensity Cardiovascular Training - Instead of doing 40 minutes of cardio, I’m doing shorter and more intense sessions. My goal is to always maintain the intensity of running 8 minute miles. Right now I’m doing 25 intense minute sessions.
3. Shadow Boxing in Sparring Gear - Shadow boxing is often done without gloves or a mouthpiece, but I’ve been putting on everything. I’ve been using 20 oz gloves, which are even heavier than sparring gloves.

Today it occurred to me how great boxing is to motivate one to get in shape. See I’ve been feeling burned out this past week and I skipped a number of workouts. This morning I even had thoughts of quitting (not serious thoughts, but thoughts nevertheless).

Tonight I get in the ring and sparred with my first really good southpaw. He beat the crap out of me. I don’t remember the last time a sparring partner cleanly landed such a high percentage of punches. Real good shots, the same beautiful counter punches over an over. I walked away frustrated and a little humiliated, but with a new fire in my eye. I gained a focused determination to get back to working hard.

Sparring partners are kind of like the ultimate personal trainer. If you don’t work hard in the gym, they’ll beat your @$$.

Some trainers just want to throw you into sparring and have you learn the hard way. But I’m going to give you the Cliff Notes on the initial rounds of sparring.

When you first start training you feel really clumsy, you look awkward and as training sessions wear on, your strikes quickly become inept due to fatigue. But once you get passed this, you start to think, “Hey, I look pretty good in mirror.” You start to think you’re becoming a real boxer. Maybe you even start to size up other guys in the gym that you might spar in the future.

You’re also going to work on things in preparation for sparring, like attempting to gauge your power on the bag/mitts, working on slips, etc. Well, here is what you should be working on:

80/20 Rule

A little boxing theory:

• 80% of offense is your lead hand, 20% is your read hand.
• The best defense is a good offense
• “Boxing is easy — if you know how to jab.” - George Foreman

Notice a pattern here? If you said work on your jab and lead hand, you are correct. Beginners like to feel the power of hooks on the bag. But if all you did was perfect your jab, you’d be far better than the guy that’s focusing on hooks, crosses and uppercuts.

How about spending 80% of your training efforts on jabbing?

Hands Up, Elbows In, Rapidly Bring Punches Straight Back

Even if you hold your hands up in training, under the pressure of sparring you will probably drop them here and there. If you train with them down, your first few rounds of sparring will hurt.

Besides keeping your hands up, keep your elbows in and guard tight in practice. Trying to pick your shots against good boxers requires some work. But beginner stances/guards often present a huge number of options for landing punches.

When you train throwing a punch, snap it back as fast as you threw it. And bring it back on the same path, don’t drop it. If you find you’re eating lots of right hands after you jab, this is probably your mistake.

Personally I would recommend avoiding guards, like the Philly Shell, that keep one hand low. Or at least avoid this type of stance until you’ve developed some defensive proficiency.

Punch & Move

Beginners usually stand still when throwing punches. Boxing is probably more about moving between punches and during punches than it is about punching.

For orthodox boxers (right handers) circling to your right and punching is harder than to your left. The reverse is true of unorthodox (lefty) boxers. Practice circling both ways, but especially to your right. Then spend your initial time in sparring circling away from your opponents power. If you think circling away from the power is for wimps, go watch the Barrera/Prince Hamed fight.

Find your range. When you punch the bag or mitts extend your lead arm straight out. If you can reach your target you’re in range. Don’t stand in range unless you’re punching. Or at least ensure you’re moving your head when in range. When training don’t get in the habit of standing in range and doing nothing.

Forget Power

Beginners have no business working on punch power or even thinking about it. When you spar for the first time it will probably be against a better boxer. If you do spar a skilled boxer you will likely have difficulty landing even a clean jab. You probably won’t land a stiff jab, let alone a power punch. For now, train to maintain balance and work on crisp fast punches.

Good luck.

This will be the first of the more informative posts which I’m going to focus on in this blog.

How much does boxing sparring hurt? …Well, it really depends on what level of training you’re involved in.

Hobbyists, Weekend Warriors, White Collar Folks
I spent years in a Muay Thai and boxing as a hobbyist. I definitely trained at reputable gyms that had reputations for producing top amateur and professional fighters, but I never expressed an interest in competing and only sparred so I could develop some proficiency.

During this period of training I would have said, “No, it doesn’t hurt that much.” The adrenalin is pumping, you’re wearing protective gear, there is a kind of a gentleman’s agreement not to kill each other, etc.

In this period of my training I did accrue some bruises, even got a black eye here or there. But overall, despite the excitement, it was pretty tame.
Competitive Boxing
Once you express a desire to compete in the amateur ranks, your training and sparring becomes more intense. You spar longer and with a better class of fighters. These guys/girls are much harder to hit and hit back a lot harder.

Getting a broken or swollen nose, black eyes, bruised or broken ribs is more common in this type of sparring. Also sparring with body punchers is more common (beginners rarely have developed body punches). The types of dings I listed don’t happen all the time, but are more common. Additionally as you develop your defensive game, it gets easier.

Really with the adrenalin pumping you often don’t feel head punches when they occur, you feel them afterwards. But body punches can hurt a lot, even with well developed abs. Taking your first liver shot is quite an experience.

I will say that sometimes there is no distinction between the sparring for the hobbyists and the real boxers. Some gyms put the hobbyists through the school of hard knocks too. However with so many hobbyists, women and yuppies flocking to even the most hardcore inner city boxing gyms, there generally are two type of sparring going on.

Of course sometimes you have to ask yourself the age old sports question: am I hurt, or am I injured? But barring injury you should really think twice about turning down sparring.

I know, just like most people I’ve refused sparring opportunities for a “good reason.” Maybe you just finished up your 3rd round and you’re too exhausted for another. Maybe you think, “I’m not ready for that guy.” Or you feel inexplicably tired and go home early to rest.

Or you might not even have a good reason. You look at that one fighter in your gym that makes you nervous and you feel the impulse to protect your ego and avoid him. You know, the super mobile guy with the fast heavy hands. Or the pretty boy or nerdy guy that you’ve seen best some traditional “thugs” in the ring. You don’t want people to see you get beaten up by that guy. Maybe you fear getting your face marked up at the hands of a superior boxer who’s a little bit rough. Maybe the resident body puncher scares you.

But think about this for a minute. You’re damn lucky to have those sparring partners. The worst possible scenario would be spending all your training sparring chumps and to step in the ring to compete with a guy far better than what you usually face.

Even with a gym packed full of great boxers, they might not always be available. Tonight I had my second training session in a row where no sparring was available. It made me regret all the times I turned down sparring and it made me appreciate the boxers that have schooled me in the ring, even when they bruised me up a bit.

I’m still being frustrated by one particular style of boxer: guys that box out of the philly shell (lead hand low, slightly sideways stance), fighting off their back foot, swaying back and rolling my punches while counter punching. One of my trainers is very adept at this style.

When sparring against this style, I circle away from the power throwing jabs and following up with straight rights when I can. Because they fight off the rear foot and sway back I have to double and triple up on my jabs to reach him while he sways back. During this jab fest his left hook is often used to counter me so I have to keep my rear hand up and stay upright.

The problem is I make a giant predictable circle around my opponent. This makes me tired and allows my opponent to cut off the ring and lead me into his right hand. I generally do well for 1 and a half rounds, get tired, then get beaten up by this style.

I’m going to spend some time watching film of boxers defeating or doing well against this style. I’ll watch some of James Toney’s (above) more successful opponents, I’ll also watch Chavez/Roger Mayweather and maybe some others.