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First i need to say that i came back to boxing recently, for the past 2 years i had been doing MMA but i never enjoyed it as much as boxing. I started going to this new gym last week and i am glad i made the decision. It made me notice that i picked up some good things and bad things from MMA. The good things are better balance, better on the inside and better overall strenght. The bads are slower reflexes, not much footwork, and i got used to sparring with kicks, knees and grappling.
At that gym there are only 2 other heavyweights, one of them just started boxing and the other one is in his early 50's and he doesn't want to spar. So the trainers invited a heavyweight from another gym to spar with me tonight.
The guy was short for a heavyweight, i'd say about 5'10 and stocky, he must have been atleast 240-250 pounds(I'm 6'4 235 right now). It was supposed to be a friendly sparring and i was reminded multiple times to not try to hurt him while we were getting ready.
So we started slowly and i did what i knew i needed to do: I kept him at the end of the jab and threw my straight left when he was comming in. In the first round he only landed 2 jabs to my stomach and he seemed really frustrated, even tho i was throwing some really light punches.
Between rounds my trainer told me to mix it up a little more and let him come on the inside. So i did, weirdly enough on the inside he was even easier to hit, he came in with his head down and i started clocking him with my right uppercut and hook. I could see he was really getting angry and he started swinging for the fences at the end of the second round. He caught me with a couple of jabs but his being looping right hand always missed.
The third and forth rounds where the same, and i was starting to get annoyed by that guy, it was supposed to be a friendly sparring and the guy was trying to take my head off. I kept my cool and i just let him come at me and i countered. So many times i could have just caved his face in, instead i just threw a small punch and moved out. This is where i noticed that my reflexes weren't as good as i wanted them to be. A couple of times i saw his right hand comming but for some reason i didn't move or try to block it so it landed. It was pissing me off that the short guy could even land a single shot on me. I still kept my cool even tho i wanted to just knock him out. I kept moving and landing the jab and my left at will with the occasional uppercut and hook. He got a bloody nose and swollen lip out of it and i am as pretty as ever.
I must say sparring that short guy felt so awkward, i was throwing my punches lower than shoulder height and hitting that guy to the body was really hard for me cause i would have to basically duck. I usually like to bob and weave and slip punches a lot but with that guy it would just have gave him a chance to hit me. Overall i am pretty happy, he didn't land more than 10 punches on my head during those 4 rounds but i can't help but think that this short guy shouldnt even have been able to hit me.
Maybe i'm just rusty, and i just need to spar more but does anybody have tips to improve reflexes? I use a slip bag but i feel it's worthless, it's slow compared to a punch.
Next time i will try find somebody to film the sparring and i'll post it here, it will be much simpler.
At that gym there are only 2 other heavyweights, one of them just started boxing and the other one is in his early 50's and he doesn't want to spar. So the trainers invited a heavyweight from another gym to spar with me tonight.
The guy was short for a heavyweight, i'd say about 5'10 and stocky, he must have been atleast 240-250 pounds(I'm 6'4 235 right now). It was supposed to be a friendly sparring and i was reminded multiple times to not try to hurt him while we were getting ready.
So we started slowly and i did what i knew i needed to do: I kept him at the end of the jab and threw my straight left when he was comming in. In the first round he only landed 2 jabs to my stomach and he seemed really frustrated, even tho i was throwing some really light punches.
Between rounds my trainer told me to mix it up a little more and let him come on the inside. So i did, weirdly enough on the inside he was even easier to hit, he came in with his head down and i started clocking him with my right uppercut and hook. I could see he was really getting angry and he started swinging for the fences at the end of the second round. He caught me with a couple of jabs but his being looping right hand always missed.
The third and forth rounds where the same, and i was starting to get annoyed by that guy, it was supposed to be a friendly sparring and the guy was trying to take my head off. I kept my cool and i just let him come at me and i countered. So many times i could have just caved his face in, instead i just threw a small punch and moved out. This is where i noticed that my reflexes weren't as good as i wanted them to be. A couple of times i saw his right hand comming but for some reason i didn't move or try to block it so it landed. It was pissing me off that the short guy could even land a single shot on me. I still kept my cool even tho i wanted to just knock him out. I kept moving and landing the jab and my left at will with the occasional uppercut and hook. He got a bloody nose and swollen lip out of it and i am as pretty as ever.
I must say sparring that short guy felt so awkward, i was throwing my punches lower than shoulder height and hitting that guy to the body was really hard for me cause i would have to basically duck. I usually like to bob and weave and slip punches a lot but with that guy it would just have gave him a chance to hit me. Overall i am pretty happy, he didn't land more than 10 punches on my head during those 4 rounds but i can't help but think that this short guy shouldnt even have been able to hit me.
Maybe i'm just rusty, and i just need to spar more but does anybody have tips to improve reflexes? I use a slip bag but i feel it's worthless, it's slow compared to a punch.
Next time i will try find somebody to film the sparring and i'll post it here, it will be much simpler.
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