Boxing is one of the toughest sports on the planet. It is known as the go to sport for athletes of all disciplines to improve their fitness, get lean and become intensely strong and conditioned. It’s also great for self-defence, feeling better about yourself and becoming an all round better athlete.
Boxing workouts can burn upwards of 800 calories in a single session and unlike the gym where people will go to build muscle, the boxing gym will help you to torch your fat, reveal and tone muscles and getting those abs to show for the summer holidays.
Losing weight involves burning more calories then you consume, being in a caloric deficit, so the diet will play a key role in whether you are losing weight or not. Like with anything in life, you get out what you put in so if you can eat clean, train 4/5 days a week or more and put in the effort, you can easily become ripped from boxing.
boxing provides an excellent way of burning a lot of calories to get into a deficit and the exercises involved are perfect for burning fat, having fun and getting lean.
Boxing Uses All Of The Bodies Energy Systems
Steady state cardio like jogging, walking or cycling will burn calories slowly and won’t hit the target areas where we want to lose fat in as much as we would like and these exercises are aerobic in nature where the body can fuel itself with oxygen to keep going. The aerobic system is the base upon which a highly conditioned athlete is built and once you built a good aerobic system through running or sports, it will stay with you for many years.
Fast intense exercises like hitting the punch bag, shadow boxing with weights, doing punching drills and working on circuits are going to hit the anaerobic system, where the muscles fill with lactic acid and cause you to feel pain and stop.
The body is not able to fuel itself with oxygen during these intense exercises that are predominant in boxing and hese kind of exercises are much more effective for burning fat, and getting in awesome shape.
High Intensity Interval Training
One of the key features that makes boxing so good for getting lean and ripped is that it is a HIIT workout.
This is a mix of Aerobic and anaerobic exercises where you go from fast pace intense exercise to slow pace active recovery movements and this back and forth, start, stop form of exercise is well known to be the best for burning fat and getting lean, like spinning class or boxing.
Reasons Boxing Is So Good For Getting Ripped
Boxing Improves Your Fitness
Boxers are some of the most well conditioned athletes in the world and it is for this reason that athletes from all other sports train in boxing to increase that anaerobic threshold so they can become faster, fitter and stronger for their own sports and have more endurance.
If you want to lose weight or if you’ve been in the gym putting on muscle, boxing is one of the best things you can do to get lean.
It’s A Full Body Workout
Boxing is a full body workout and there’s tons of variation, you can train for boxing on your own and once you get into boxing, it becomes like a mission to improve at the sport and that goes hand in hand we’re being in great shape.
Boxing primarily involves the arms, back, chest and shoulders but the Punch comes up from your foot through your hips and extends out through your lats to generate the maximum power and punch.
When you slip a roll under a punch that’s using the legs and the workouts for boxing involve so many different exercises that you really get to blast the full body in a single workout.
Boxing Is fun
Going to the gym at running on a treadmill for an hour can seem like a boring and daunting task, boxing training is good fun as it involves so much variety, it’s fast-paced, you get a train with a partner and you get to see your improvements week on week which gives you something to aim for going forward.
You can also have good fun with your trainers and partners throughout your workouts as opposed to dragging yourself to the gym every week for mundane exercise but you will end up giving up quickly.
Boxing Is A Lifestyle
Once you get into boxing, it’s not something that you have to force yourself to do every week, it’s something that you look forward to and you can plan your life around improving at the sport, getting in better condition and then losing weight and getting ripped will become a secondary benefit.
That is why so many people from all walks of life use boxing to get in great shape because it’s enjoyable and addictive.
Releases Endorphins
The intense exercise of boxing has been proven to release tons of endorphins into the brain which is the feel good hormone. That is why you feel so good after a boxing workout and when you feel good it’s much easier to make the right choices like eating healthy and building on your exercise regimen.
Exercises That Make Boxing The Best For Losing Weight
Skipping
Skipping is one of the best exercises for boxing as it improves hand and feet coordination which is the most important aspect of boxing and the late Roger Mayweather once said that skipping is the key to being a great boxer.
It is also great for burning calories, you can go at a slower pace or a faster pace, you can do HIIT and if you bring your knees up to your stomach as you sprint on the rope, it is superb at burning stubborn belly fat and revealing your abs.
It’s also a great workout for the shoulders and arm endurance and can burn fat in your arms and tone them to reveal your muscles.
Shadow boxing
Shadow boxing is another great way to improve your skills, you can visualise your opponent, practice the moves you’ve been doing on the pads and the bags and cement your techniques into muscle memory.
It is a great way to burn calories especially if you use a light pair of weighted dumbbells, not more than 3 pounds, to add resistance to the workout.
Working on your straight punches, will build muscle in the shoulders and lats, and target fat in those areas to help you get ripped.
Uppercuts with weights is a perfect endurance exercise for burning fat and it will build muscle and conditioning in the biceps and back.
Hitting The Heavy Bag
The heavy bag is one of the best ways to workout in boxing, it provides a large target that you can hit with punches over and over again and it will keep coming back for more.
You can use it for drills with a partner, you can practice your techniques and footwork and it provides an excellent way to work out on your own or with a partner.
The key is to be organised with the heavy bag
Avoid just hitting the bag until you get tired, taking a small rest and then hitting it again. Instead, get a good timer app on your phone set up for two or three minute rounds and then work for 5 to 10 rounds for an effective workout.
For an even more intense heavy bag, you can do 20 push-ups, sit ups are burpees at the end of each round.
Punching Drills On The Bag
If you have a partner to hold the bag, you can take turns of working out and actively resting. If your partner holds the bag for a minute while you throw fast straight punches as quick as you can for a minute and then you can swap over and hold the bag for them, it’s very effective. On the next round you can throw punches as hard as you can for the minute before switching and you can keep doing this for 5 rounds, that’s an excellent work out for getting in shape.
Pad Drills With A Coach Or Partner
Working the pads with a coach is a great way to improve your boxing techniques as they will be able to provide feedback in realtime so you can make adjustments and it’s also a great workout to hit the pads tired as hard as you can and develop your combos to become a better fighter.
Drills with a partner are also very effective for burning fat and calories. You can throw one punch and do one push-up, and then 2 punches, 2 push-ups, all the way up to 10 and then switch with your partner to allow them to run through the drill.
In the second round you can switch push ups with sit-ups and in the third round you can do burpees.
This is a great way to burn a ton of calories, strengthen and tone your arms and get a great workout on your abs.
Sparring
Sparring is the ultimate in boxing training as it’s the closest you can come to having a real fight while still remaining in a semi competitive environment.
You need to work equally on your defence and your offence, it’s great fun when you get into it and it burns a tonne of calories moving around the ring, throwing punches, evading them and blocking.
Circuits
Boxing is well known for its circuits in the gym and this will involve a ton of different stations and each person taking part will do 30 seconds on each station before quickly moving on to the next one without a break and once everyone has completed all the stations the round will finish.
Stations might include, shadow boxing weights, push ups, squats, shoulder press, mountain climbers, burpees, sit ups, planks, lunges and dips to name a few and working on all of these together will increase your anaerobic threshold, burn fat, tone your arms and reveal your muscles.
Core workouts
Finishing off your boxing session by working the core is common practice, this will strengthen your abs and get them to show off more easily once you get your diet right
Use different variations of sit ups, planks, mountain climbers and burpees all in a row without stopping for a couple of rounds of 30 reps each, will build those core muscles and get them to show once you get to the right body fat percentage, by eating healthy and remaining in a caloric deficit.
Supplement Your Training With Cardio
If you supplement your training which cardio like running or cycling even once a week for an hour or two, this will develop your aerobic base so you can build on that in the boxing gym to increase your anaerobic threshold and endurance.
If you get good enough a boxing, the weight loss will easily follow and you’ll become ripped and in the best condition of your life.
Getting The Diet Right
As we mentioned already, losing weight will involve being in a caloric deficit which basically means that you burn more than you eat. Boxing will help you to do this by burning a tonne of calories when you work out, but just like anything what you get out will be similar to what you put in.
If you do 3 or 4 days a boxing with maybe a day or two in the gym or some cardio outside the gym, you’ll be putting yourself in a good position to lose weight and get ripped.
The key with the diet to losing weight is the cut out the carbs and to get a lot of healthy protein and fats that will allow the muscle to build and repair itself.
Cutting out the carbs is important because carbs will turn into energy the most quickly and if it’s not burned for fuel it will convert into fat, removing the carbs from your diet makes it a lot more easy to lose the fat and get into great shape.
Eat steady flow of fruit, vegetables and good protein sources like lean meat and cut out useless carbs like bread, soft drinks and and just general rubbish food like takeaways if you’re serious about getting ripped with boxing.
Boxing will do it’s part if you put in the work, make sure you do your part in the kitchen with your diet.