Q for biomechanical people and trainers of female boxers

[Sharla]

I've been googling Q angle etc to make sense of my knee MRI results (which are at the end of this post in case anyone happens to have any comments ) and I read the on average a female has her body weight sitting one inch lower and behind that of a man. A woman will tend to have her body weight over her heel whereas a man will have his over his toes. Thinking about it I'd be surprised if a female can really train exactly the same way a man can and have the same power/balance. What adjustments would the trainers recommend for a female boxer that are not applicable to the guys?



MRI results:

A routine MR protocol demonstrates normal appearance to the anterior and posterior cruciate ligaments. The medial and lateral menisci also appear normal. No abnormality is seen in the medial or lateral collateral ligaments. The chondral and subchondral surfaces appear normal and there is no increased signal within the marrow space.

The infrapatellar tendon on the sagittal PD images appears normal. There is increased signal within the marrow space of the inferolateral patellar facet. The overlying patellar cartilage thickness does however appear normal. The appearances would be consistent with some patellar marrow oedema and probable early chondromalacia. There is no significant joint effusion.

[Trainer Monkey]

Hey Sharla
Notice how I have Feur moving to the sides to load up,rather then planting
Lots of side to sides and crossovers
Memo to self,throttle her sparring partner blue,idiot made her bleed trying to prove he could hang with her with a potential fight in less then a month.Dipsh$t is ten years her junior,4 inches her senior,and 60 pound her heavier,dingbat she was,she gave him the lighter gloves,and he might have broke even.
Sorry just bitching,Im seriously PO'ed
Go for lots of side to side movement to load your power punches,its easier on your knees,and for some reason most female fighters find it elusive.

[Killerqueen]

Hey Sharla
Notice how I have Feur moving to the sides to load up,rather then planting

Trainer Monkey: where can i see that? Is there a topic on that?
thanks for the answer

[Sharla]

Thanks Monkey. I'll play around with that nest time I'm in the gym and see if I understand what you mean. I get the impression moving sideways works well but I didn't think of it in terms of female biomechanics. Thanks for the new perspective.

Bitching is healthy to a point I think. Otherwise you'll just want to kill him even more if you don't get it off your chest right? Hope he didn't break her nose. She'll have to put on the light gloves herself one day when he's tired but she's fresh and bash him herself I guess some beginner dudes just don't understand that bashing the midget capitalizing on brute force alone doesn't make them the greatest .... or even better - just wankier!

Perhaps he might even understand the importance of demonstrating control a little more if his sparring is reduced until he has it. Still some people have a screw loose somewhere too.

I had my nose broken in sparring ages ago by a heavyweight who could tap away gently until he felt embarrassed and then would just rip in a few hard ones. I sparred him three times and every time it ended in me bleeding. This was in a past club and he has since been banned by my current club because he loses his temper with everyone.

[Howlin Mad Missy]

Hey Sharla
Notice how I have Feur moving to the sides to load up,rather then planting
Lots of side to sides and crossovers
Memo to self,throttle her sparring partner blue,idiot made her bleed trying to prove he could hang with her with a potential fight in less then a month.Dipsh$t is ten years her junior,4 inches her senior,and 60 pound her heavier,dingbat she was,she gave him the lighter gloves,and he might have broke even.
Sorry just bitching,Im seriously PO'ed
Go for lots of side to side movement to load your power punches,its easier on your knees,and for some reason most female fighters find it elusive.

Were you supervising? Then you or whomever should have been watching should have stopped it right away.

[Howlin Mad Missy]

I think the first is probably the best source

To help prevent injuries, women athletes should make sure they are strong in the quadriceps, hamstrings, hip abductors, hip external rotators, abdominals and obliques. The neuromuscular coordination of the knee joint deceleration movement should be trained with landing, cutting and hopping drills. The correct techniques for landing and cutting should be practised and the correct shoes should always be worn.


http://www.pponline.co.uk/encyc/0150.htm

http://www.easyvigour.net.nz/fitness...us_max_leg.htm
http://www.bahshe.demon.co.uk/public...le-athlete.htm
http://www.nismat.org/ptcor/female_knee/index.html


I don't think there is anything specific that should be taken or added from a female/male routine however being aware of our differences I think is important but being aware that every person training will have different needs is just as important.

[Chris Nagel]

I've been googling Q angle etc to make sense of my knee MRI results (which are at the end of this post in case anyone happens to have any comments ) and I read the on average a female has her body weight sitting one inch lower and behind that of a man. A woman will tend to have her body weight over her heel whereas a man will have his over his toes. Thinking about it I'd be surprised if a female can really train exactly the same way a man can and have the same power/balance. What adjustments would the trainers recommend for a female boxer that are not applicable to the guys?

That may hold true when you're standing upright, but for boxing the same biomechanics apply. You'll have to shift your weight, find an angle and create enough leverage for your punches. Everyone's musculature and weight distribution is different. A good trainer may have a good eye for this when make a minor adjustment in his fighter's stance. Maybe scrap can reiderate this since he background in this.

Anyways how's your training coming along? Is that floppy tendon coming around yet?

Hey Sharla
Notice how I have Feur moving to the sides to load up,rather then planting
Lots of side to sides and crossovers
Memo to self,throttle her sparring partner blue,idiot made her bleed trying to prove he could hang with her with a potential fight in less then a month.Dipsh$t is ten years her junior,4 inches her senior,and 60 pound her heavier,dingbat she was,she gave him the lighter gloves,and he might have broke even.
Sorry just bitching,Im seriously PO'ed
Go for lots of side to side movement to load your power punches,its easier on your knees,and for some reason most female fighters find it elusive.

I don't know how things work over there, but If I was the fighter I'd be more "PO'ed" at the trainer or seconds that were supposed to be watching and keeping things under control. What's your excuse?

[Trainer Monkey]

Hey Sharla
Notice how I have Feur moving to the sides to load up,rather then planting
Lots of side to sides and crossovers
Memo to self,throttle her sparring partner blue,idiot made her bleed trying to prove he could hang with her with a potential fight in less then a month.Dipsh$t is ten years her junior,4 inches her senior,and 60 pound her heavier,dingbat she was,she gave him the lighter gloves,and he might have broke even.
Sorry just bitching,Im seriously PO'ed
Go for lots of side to side movement to load your power punches,its easier on your knees,and for some reason most female fighters find it elusive.

Were you supervising? Then you or whomever should have been watching should have stopped it right away.

I send her to a different gym once a week to get work in.
Somebodies got to watch the son though,so Im stuck here,believe you me,if Id seen him loading up on her,it would have ended right there
Guy's 6'4" 220 and he's loading up on a 165 pound woman,in freaking sparring no less
Trust me,all involved parties now know,that,that is to NEVER happen again
Ive calmed down to the point were the vein in my forehead isnt visible anymore at least

[Trainer Monkey]

Hey Sharla
Notice how I have Feur moving to the sides to load up,rather then planting

Trainer Monkey: where can i see that? Is there a topic on that?
thanks for the answer

There is one,but to hit you quick
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sc2hgbnvbgY
Its dark,so youll want to hit the bigscreen button to watch it better

[Killerqueen]

CC

fun to see. Looks a bit like my fight

[Trainer Monkey]

CC

fun to see. Looks a bit like my fight

Back at you
I have to give Ronnee the girl she's fighting,credit for being game
She had absolutely no reason at all to get up in the third,shed been down twice,the one in the third looks like her lights are out out,and completely outworked in the second.She got up out of pride and heart. I appreciate that,because you cant teach it,either you have it or you dont.

[Sharla]

Even when a coach is watching there's no guarantee that they can prevent something like this happening. It only takes one over-zealous combo out of a moment of annoyance for a big guy to bash a smaller person. Embarrassment of a novice guy getting hit by a girl can be an unpredictable factor sometimes.

The article I read about female body weight was focused on skiing which is not an upright sport either. Since we spend so much time on our toes surely the fact that our body weight tends to be further back behind our toes than for guys must make a smidge of a difference?

More push off the back toes to help keep the centre of gravity foreward perhaps? Which might mean we have to bend our knees a little more so we're not barging in chin first? Does that make any sense to anyone or is this just BS? I guess it could all be irrelevant if doing Scrap's balance exercises since you'd naturally find the best stance anyway.

I agree with what you said about injury prevention Missy but having my experience with this injury I think flexibility plays more of a role than I thought aswell. Tight ITB and groin/hips might be where my issues came from.

I'll check out those links aswell so thanks for those :-)

[Howlin Mad Missy]

Perhaps he shouldn't have been in with her? I also think much of what happens in the ring comes from the top. There are only one or two guys I would feel comfortable sparring without supervision because all the lads respected each other had a great club spirit and never went mad like that, they knew they'd a, probably get done over by someone else in the club and b, get thrown out for good. Other places I would feel very uneasy.

When I started to spar it was always with a more experienced guy.


I don't think where we have our weight when in stance should play apart unless your technique is bad. Weight distribution is different due to weight round our hips and a guys across his shoulders, probably why we wiggle when we walk, try this little exercise, try walking like a man.

[Sharla]

I just saw a video of myself running and saw a whole lot of hip action and really don't think i even need to attempt to walk like a man to see your point here :-)

I guess the main thing that gets me - since I was a kickboxer before being a boxer - is the fact that I can't stop anyone heavier from walking straight through my punches. I could as a kickboxer with a well timed straight kick to the body that would work against guys 20 kg heavier than me.

Now one of my coaches drills me on keeping my guard up. He walks through as many as 5 consecutive punches to put pressure on me and force me to use my guard. His nose gets messed up but his momentum is not altered.

I tend to think that if my weight distribution was as a guy's is I could transfer weight into my punches more easily because it's already higher and more of it is upper body. I guess there may not be any way to combat this but as Monkey said there is nothing to stop us transferring our body weight sideways for hooks etc just as well.

I also tend to feel that most of my sparring is counterpunching and usingangles moving backwards because guys are all able to come foreward through my body weight more than the male kickboxers used to. I guess I shouldn't attack head on a lot anyway and should use my angles even more. Sideways movement as Monkey says.

I know what you mean about the sparring beginner guys. They don't know what a hard punch is yet so every punch is scarier than it really should be and they strike out - out of intimidation more than an experienced guy. I think experienced guys also put more worth on training time and effort than beginners and are less likely to be embarrassed if you get one in on them.

[Trainer Monkey]

Can,and do you plant at all?
Im not asking a silly question,but I know alot of trainers,and alot of boxers think power is driven by the shoulders or even worse just muscle,when the really scary power is actually driven by the hips.If your driving your hips in to the shot,they shouldnt be just walking through,or even wanting to play with you anymore.