SWING HARD OR SOFT, BUT HIT THE SWEET SCIENCE

If The Heavy Bag Could Talk

No matter the age or gender, we never lose the urge to fight.

We fight for one thing or another all our lives.

It’s not always called a fight, but it can feel like it. And you can still win.

During the 1920’s Golden Age of Sports, college football, Major League Baseball, and boxing ruled.

The older baby boomers get, the idea of playing a hard game of football or baseball grows distant.

The older our folks get, the greater the distance.

But not boxing.

A sport to train all ages, boxing takes balance, coordination, and strength. You don’t have to float like a butterfly and sting like a bee to reap the rewards.

Boxing gives a chance for mothers and daughters to learn new things and avoid others. Like the part of my wife’s practice at the Portland Wellness Center that’s prevention based, boxing prevents lack of confidense.

The best way to begin a boxing exercise regime is find a heavy bag, along with the chain, and hang it from a beam in the garage.

Add realism by picking up a set of sixteen ounce Everlast boxing gloves with the elastic wrists. You could use garden gloves, but why not look the part?

I began the lesson with my mother-in-law. Once she had the gloves on, I had her reach out and touch my hand. No punching. I wanted to see her range and flexibility.

After a few swings, we moved to the heavy bag. Most people want to sock the heck out of the big bag right away. Instead, approach with your guard up, peaking out from behind the gloves like the first image.

Shift your weight from side to side, stepping back on one foot, then the other. Find a natural rhythm.

Get your dance on, going side to side, back and forth, and reach a gloved hand out. Don’t punch the bag, just touch it.

Dance to the left, reach out with your right hand. Dance to the right, poke your left out.

Lean over slightly and dip your shoulders right to left. Dance a little then swing back.

On the next right to left shoulder dip, finish with a left jab. Come back with a right hook. That’s what the punches are called, hooks, jabs, crosses, upper-cuts. Reaching out and touching the bag is what they all mean.

Shuffle your feet to the left, circling the bag, popping high with the left, digging a body blow with the right. Now shuffle back to the right, still swinging.

You’ll feel balance, coordination, and strength.

Most of all you’ll feel yourself saying, “You want some of this? Well here it is.”

Whap, whap, whap.

And that’s how it is at the BoomerPDX gym.