Sunday, November 07, 2004

Boxing Dayz

Had my first sparring class yesterday. Ended up being 3 hours worth of classes, as I showed up for pilates at 10:15, and the sparring class wasn't until noon, so I had an hour of pilates, an hour of boxing (partnered mitts), and then an hour of sparring.

Do you have any idea how badly I hurt right now?

Today's game is, "I wonder why *that* hurts?" I was trying to figure out why my forearms hurt - it's because my forearms were taking the majority of the blows aimed at my head.

It turned out to only be two of us staying for sparring. Natalie was my same belt rank, and we'd been partnered during boxing. When I saw she was staying, I stayed for sparring, too, and we learned defensive moves for half an hour before being turned on one another.

Natalie's no wimp - we're the same belt rank, though I've got a couple more stripes, and my footwork is better. But I was also a couple inches taller than her and about 50lbs heavier. Pair that with my hesitance at hitting people, and what you end up with is me pulling a lot of my punches.

This is fine, unless the person you're with is playing for keeps.

Lyndon said I did well in the beginning, when I was on top of my footwork, but got tired at the end, and I moved into defensive more than offensive, and Natalie got in three good hits - one to the left side of my face, and the other two to my gut. I managed to glance off the rest, but at the end, I was frickin exhausted.

It was a good lesson in why I need to get jogging again. My endurance is crap (and, granted, I'd just done three hours worth of classes. Still).

Actually sparring with a partner is wildly different from all of the other boxing drills. You can punch mitts and a bag and dance with a mitted partner forever, but trying to hit somebody who's actively trying to hit you back for the first time is really overwhelming. It brings home what all of these drills and the harping on and on about all the footwork are really all about.

After class, when Lyndon was making observations about how we did, I said, "My problem is I have this fear of hitting people. It's like I don't want to hurt anyone."

He said, "Hitting people is easy. That's the easiest part. That's not the problem. It's *not* getting hit that you need to worry about."

Ah. That's me. Always concerned about the wrong thing.

After class, Natalie said she was coming next week, and she's been looking for a good sparring partner. Mostly, her trouble with learning boxing has been similiar to mine, in that we're always paired with people who are wildly higher belt ranks, and we were both pretty pleased to be sparring against somebody who's rank was the same.

So next week we'll be at it again. This time, I'll be more concerned about not getting hit.

I met up with Jenn at a nearby cafe where Mary Anne et al. usually show up, but I didn't recognize any of the other writers there. No matter. I stayed and wrote for two hours, pushing to the end of the first chapter of my latest book, then Jenn and I caught the bus and then the train home.

It was a beautiful day yesterday, and I don't know that there's anything better than three hours of MA classes followed by two hours of cafe writing, then a nice trek home in the sun.

It's a good life.

2 comments so far. What are your thoughts?

Anonymous said...

Random comment -- dunno how much of this applies to what your school is teaching.

"Not getting hit" is certainly one way to think about it, but that didn't work for me. That line of thinking had me darting away from people, keeping wildly out of reach and then running toward them when I decided to go on offense -- it tired me out, and if I ever got into a corner or got outrun, I panicked.

Instead, what eventually worked for me was a combination of "make them overextend" and "don't take an UGLY hit".

Making them overextend means sitting right on the edge of their reach, so that if they want to actually hit you, they have to take a single step in, and then you clock them as soon as that happens, because I know you, and you've got awesome reach and strong arms and can TOTALLY turn hitting people into a psychological thing that's going to have them trying to move in and GUARD at the same time, which messes up their whole attack strategy. Or they try to freak you out with punches (or kicks, in kickboxing) that are too far away to hit you, but because you've got their distance nailed, you can just let them tire themselves out.

Not taking ugly hits means that you were totally right to be taking hits on the forearms. Forearms, shoulders, all that stuff -- good. Hell, letting their hook swish over the top of your head is good. Grazes are not going to get you hurt. Solid whacks are going to get you hurt. And if you've got your distancing right, the only solid whacks you take are on your immensely tough arms and shoulders. You're still getting hit, yeah, but those are almost good hits -- they're getting your adrenaline up, and you're tough enough to deal with those. Once you can internalize "Aha, that was just a couple of grazes and a forearm shot. This isn't TAG. They didn't WIN right there. >I< won by not taking a solid hit while they used some valuable energy doing NOTHING to me," you can almost always get to the next point -- which is letting those punches slide off your shoulders and arms while you calmly step in, feel what their arms are doing, and then punch where their arms AREN'T.

Might be a different style of boxing, or a place that your teacher doesn't want you to go yet, so take it with a grain of salt.

And kickass, Kam. Sounds great.

PS: I totally hear the psychological problem with hitting people. When I realized that kicking someone HARD in a non-scoring area (like the hip, in kickboxing) just because I knew it would make them think twice before moving in on me -- when I'd actually gotten that from "things only mean people do" to "effective strategy that uses discomfort as a deterrent" -- it marked a real turning point for me.
 

Posted by Patrick Weekes

Anonymous said...

Well, by "hit" I think he definately meant the "hurt you" kind of hit, as we were learning defense and how to take a hit on our forearms and shoulders for much of the class.

And yea, on the ethics of hitting people - it takes some getting used to... In any event, I'm having a great time. 

Posted by Kameron Hurley