Sunday Funday !!

Hello

So, the guys are now finished week 3 and having chatted to a lot of them, most can't believe how fast it has went, how much we have learned and how we really don't like Ben on a Sunday.
Sunday sessions are definitely the toughest, think its a combination of being hungover (only joking Ben) no seriously, its a combination of having a little bit more time, than we do during the week, less people in the gym and Ben just being an evil f...er ha ha.

So todays session, which we already knew would involve sparring in the ring, although I thought it would be mainly sparring (not sure which I would've liked more ?), looked like this -

Most of the guys now turn up earlier than the 10 A.M. start to either get a bit of one to one advice or to get a bit of pratice in on their own.
So we were all warm when Ben took us for a gentle jog ! Which involved the following - Hill sprints, both individually and in pairs, linking arms and sprinting isn't as easy as it sounds ! Before moving on to some stair sprints on the 3 different sets of stairs on the route Ben picked, before finishing off (finishing off being an apt term) on the now very familiar Fort steps, the lactic acid build up on those last 20 or so steps was almost unbearable, I also thought my lungs were going to burst out of my chest as I reached the top of that last set, looking at the other guys, I think we were all in the same boat.

But again the one thing that did stick out was the togetherness and the determination of all the guys, no matter their fitness levels everyone pushed themselves to their own limit, while encouraging the others as we passed each other on hills and stairs.

So easy bit over !!

Back into the gym and on the Sundays, we have use of two rings, so there can be six guys, working on the round robin system, we had used on Thursday, 2 guys working 1 resting, 2 minutes work 1 minute rest. The rest of the guys were on bag and pad work, then another 6 got a chance to spar.

'Luckily' I was in one of the first groups to spar, this time with Miles and Mark, whom I had never paired up with let alone sparred so it was into the unknown for all of us, although this is the best way to learn different styles of opponent.

This time we stepped it up again, using headguards (which are a lot easier to get used to than I thought they might be) and  groin guards. We also put a little vaseline on our faces and gloves, just to help prevent injuries if we got hit, sorry when we got hit ha ha.

First up it was myself and Miles, we were only allowed to throw two punches at a time, which helped you focus and stopped it turning into mayhem.
First minute, we both were a little tentative, me probably more than Miles who seemed very comfortable in the ring, then Mark stepped in for Miles and I started my second minute a bit better, throwing better punches and blocking or just getting out the way of Marks punches.
Mark did seem a bit nervous but, like all of us, he improved as the rounds went on.
During your rest minute Alan would give you tips on technique and strategy against the other two, which really helped as I caught Miles a couple of times in our third round, by which time we were allowed to throw three punches, but no body shots.

Although still making a lot of mistakes, which is cool as its all still very new to me, I do feel that I am getting a little better every time, thats just after 3 weeks, still 7 to go, so who knows how good we will all become ?

The actual hardest part for me is breathing with the gumshield in, so I am going to try wearing it a lot more when I'm training, not only at boxing sessions, but my Strength and conditioning sessions during the week, to see if that helps as losing my breath quicker than I should be, will be a major handicap on my sparring and on fight night.

After sparring, we moved through to gym, where we had 5 X 3 minute rounds of skipping, followed by a 'every ounce of energy we had left sapping' circuit, 2 laps, 9 exercises, first lap 30 secs with 10 secs rest, second 20 secs with 10secs rest, again it was everyone who got everyone through it.

Job done !

As I said Sundays are definitely the hardest sessions now, but everyone knows this is what we need to do, the better our fitness the better we will be on the night, so deep deep deep deep deep deep deep deep down, we appreciate what Ben and his guys are doing to us.

Starting new nutrition regime based round my training tomorrow, as I feel although I've been eating well, i now need to focus on what and when I'm eating foods in relation to my training. So I can have maximum energy during sessions, while also speeding recovery and repair. And also shifting excess bodyfat and inflammation.

Will keep you posted how its going.


Bring on Tuesday

Craig :-)