It's been a while since the post on getting equipped for heavy bag training. That post dealt with different types of bags, gloves, mounts, etc. Now that you're set up to do some hitting (aka "wapping"), what should you do?
It seems that most people will try to "fight" the heavy bag, throwing whatever random strikes at it that may pop into their heads (or hands). While this can be entertaining to watch, it rarely leads to a good or sustainable workout. At StrongFast Fitness, we keep most of our bag training simple.
The video below shows how to do some basic heavy bag training (which is really all you need). It's kind of long, by internet standards, despite skipping over most of the details. A brief summary follows the video in this post. (Apologies for the occasional focus issues--in this case, auto-focus should be renamed "out-of-focus.")
Here's a brief recap of the points from the video:
- For punches just do jabs (straight lead), cross (rear lead), and hooks.
- Combine the jab and cross into "the old one-two."
- Stay in the same stance for all punching. Typically this means standing with your dominant hand back.
- Do front kicks by raising your knee high first and then sharply extending your leg, striking with the ball of your foot. (Don't push.)
- Hold the bag with both hands and drive your knee forward into it. Beware doing this in shorts as it can skin your knees.
- Do kicks and knees with the rear leg, changing stance as needed.
- Hit the bag for counts; for example, 10 jabs, 10 crosses, 10 one-twos, 5 lead hooks, 5 rear hooks, 5 front kicks with each leg, 5 knees with each leg (alternating).
- Adjust counts down if that's too much, or don't do all the strikes.
- Intensity is huge! The harder and faster you hit, the more tiring it will be. But don't sacrifice power for speed or form for either.
You can do "rounds" of these counts, resting as needed in between. The more intensity you can generate, the harder it will be meaning reduced counts and/or rounds but a great workout!
I strongly recommend you get some training in how to hit. There's much more to it than meets the eye: you don't need to be huge to generate lots of power. And more power means more intensity which makes for a better workout (and more fun).
Finally, don't think this kind of training is for guys only; it's also a great workout for you gals.
Now get wapping!
Be seeing you.
-gary