weight lifting for boxing

[PunchDrunk]

Hey PunchDrunk, instead of flipping out and bitching about how wrong everyone is, why don't you maybe give us some examples of strength training? It's easy to say, Oh you're so wrong I'm sick of this BS!"

But if you give us a little more information, maybe we can help other people in the future when they ask questions like this...Unless you want to be the forum police on weightlifting posts.

Haha, I have been for a while now...

It's just that I've had this discussion many times in here, usually with someone new each time. And usually someone saying the same **** that they have no knowledge about.
It might be wise to search through some of the old threads, if there's something you're curious about. A lot of the answers are already there.

The thing about the information.. It's quite hard to do, because there are so many basic things that need to be covered. Imagine you had to teach someone who had never seen a boxing match how to box, over this forum, in a few posts. Can that be done? I don't think so.

I CAN give you a few pointers, but it'll be basic stuff. It's like with boxing. If you're in your bedroom wanting to learn how to fight, go to a gym. In this case, read a few books, then go to a gym where they can teach you how to lift with proper technique.

More when I've had something to eat...

[PunchDrunk]

In my opinion strength training should be used for what it's name says: Strength. There's no reason to fool around with 20 rep bench presses. It won't make you stronger, it won't make you more conditioned for fighting. Let conditioning be conditioning, and strength training be strength training (well, it can be combined, but I don't want to confuse the issue).

To train for strength, you need to lift heavy weights. Lifts of 1-6 reps is considered optimal for strength, and the effects you get are mostly neural adaptations, ie. No muscle gain, just strength gain.
Now, if you do lots and lots of sets, with low reps, you can gain some muscle, but if you keep your workload pretty low, that shouldn't be a problem. You'll want to do big compound movements like deadlifts, squats, pullups, bend over rows, bench presses, Dumbell presses, lunges, power cleans, power snatch, full contact twist, upright neider press, etc...

In addition to the strength portion of training, different exercises can be used to convert the gain in max strength to a more sports specific power. Med ball throws, mimicking punches, punch drill with 1-4 lb. hand weights (regular shadowboxing is more skill based and should be done without the weights IMO), heavy bag work with weighted cuffs etc.

Add to that, attention to punching technique and explosiveness, and you can create a program, you can create a program for the indivdual, that will increase not only punching power, but also movement speed and clinching power.

A program is highly individual, and depends on your age, training experience, individual strengths and weaknesses, training frequency and a million other things, that makes Shane Mosley's training schedule useless for you.

[Trick]

PunchDrunk may be a little frusrated with this discussion, but I can't really blame him. First off, it is impossible to give you some kind of "rundown" on the physiology of all this. If it was, all my years studying this in university would have been a pretty big waste of time.

I'm not going to say anything he already said, but I will add on to it using myself as an example, specifically the part he said about strength does not equal muscle mass.

Weight training is a key part of my training, I do it every other day after I finish (more specific) boxing training (with an average of an hour of rest time between). I've been able to increase the amount I lift while staying at 69kgs. I don't go up in weight, but I manage to lift more. I suppose I get more toned as the weeks go by, but I don't look more "JACKED" or however you want to put it... Actually, I got sick a while ago, and am now down to about 67kg, and am lifting the same (and for some reason I can't understand, I've had trouble getting back up to 69kg, but can't get down to 64... but that's off topic). Now my weight progression isn't as fast as many, but my point is I'm not gaining size (as least not really).

Anyways for all that, I'm considered one of the fittest guys at my gym, and (possibly) the fastest. I'm not gonna lay out my whole routine, but suffice it to day I don't really do conc. bicep curls, and I do a lot of compound time things (squats, standing free-weight shoulder....). Also, many things I do, I focus on lifting powerfully (fast...pretty much) as opposed to maxing out some weight but lifting it slowly.

As PunchDrunk said though, really, it's a very individual thing, so someone else's routine is of no real use to you. Even mine changes. If my boxing training wasn't all too intense that day, I'll go hard on the weights, if I killed myself at the gym, I ease up on the weight training.

Now I'm not saying weight training is a MUST, Edison Miranda claims to never lift a weight. Personally though, for me, it's very useful. But for anything more specific (and useful to you), you'll have to talk to your trainer, and any trainer worth his salt (these days) should know a thing or two about how to weight-train for boxing.

Just don't let anyone tell you it makes you slow, because RJJ could crack you in the face five times before the words even made it outta your mouth...

[RockyMarcianofan00]

The way I used to strength train was Start at or around your maximum weight and work your way down doing many sets of as many reps as you could....

It worked well...