I got a question.....

[Sharla]

Being fit can mean so many different things really. What would make you feel fit and what kind of results would you be happy with?

I mean while I'd never really be into it some guys just want to be as HUGE as possible. Some just want to be lean and ripped. Some want to participate in more outdoor activities etc which will be easier with a good base level of cardiovascular fitness.

You might want to do enough resistance work to maintain good long term bone density and enough cardio to go out and play a game of social soccer or basketball or whatever.

You don't have to have really competitive goals but it helps to have goals to keep in mind when you plan your training. I think you might find it easier to decide what training to do and be more motivated to do it if you know specifically what results you're aiming for. You'll see the point of each individual exercise.

Also how much time do you want to spend training?

[CutMeMick]

Being fit can mean so many different things really. What would make you feel fit and what kind of results would you be happy with?

I mean while I'd never really be into it some guys just want to be as HUGE as possible. Some just want to be lean and ripped. Some want to participate in more outdoor activities etc which will be easier with a good base level of cardiovascular fitness.

Lean and fit.
I just want to look good and feel good about my body. I used to be able to take off my shirt and look good now I hesitate to do it. I still look OK but I'm not as lean as before and I want that back.
I weigh 173 lbs. and I want to loose the little tires that have begun to form around my waist.
I would be happy droping down to at least 150 and looking fit.

You might want to do enough resistance work to maintain good long term bone density and enough cardio to go out and play a game of social soccer or basketball or whatever.

You don't have to have really competitive goals but it helps to have goals to keep in mind when you plan your training. I think you might find it easier to decide what training to do and be more motivated to do it if you know specifically what results you're aiming for. You'll see the point of each individual exercise.

Also how much time do you want to spend training?

I def. have some goals set I also know that maitaning my body fit and looking good is the harder part of it. I play soccer every Sunday and usually when I come hope I'll lift some weights and or do some push ups or sit ups.

One thing I know and I know for sure is I've got good stamina. I know that much...

[Tom Tabin]

How can you circle or use any kind of footwork on a system like this? This set up will cause you to be a very stationary, 2-D, straight line fighter as its disallows your ability to move around the bag.

I notice a lot of guys just standing in front of the bag and throwing punches which strikes me as strange since in boxing you are never fighting against an opponent that just stands still for you.

[Chris Nagel]

How can you circle or use any kind of footwork on a system like this? This set up will cause you to be a very stationary, 2-D, straight line fighter as its disallows your ability to move around the bag.

I notice a lot of guys just standing in front of the bag and throwing punches which strikes me as strange since in boxing you are never fighting against an opponent that just stands still for you.

Hi Thomas,

Welcome back. I agree with you, however the guy isn't aiming at becoming a fighter, just some exercise. I think at least he ought to learn how to throw punches right because otherwise bad punching really puts wear and tear on the shoulders especially. By no means will this get him ready to fight but at least he'll get to take some steam off, and have a workout.

[Sharla]

Well as someone who has good stamina you could potentially use that to your advantage and have one long cardio session a week - working up to 2 or 2.5 hours. You'd want to perhaps alternate between the bike and the treadmill in say 20 min lots. That could help burn some fat and teach your body to metabilise fat a little more efficiently.

There's no point in thinking about that if you don't want to spend that much time in one session and get bored easily though. You'd also need to keep up your weights to prevent you just getting smaller rather than leaner which can happen.

Sounds like you enjoy resistancw work which you could keep up but just work out a structure which would suit you time wise. General principles which you already know would be not to work the same muscle group 2 days in a row so you could either do your whole body in a weights session and skip a day or two or break your body up into muscle groups to do a shorter session more often.

Cardio wise I think it'd be good to get into the habit of doing some say at least 3 probably 4 times a week but that could include your soccer game and unless you decide you enjoy it enough to go down the endurance path wouldn't need to take more than 30 mins.

If you want to do sprints - say to improve your explosive ability for soccer you'd want say at least a 15 minute easy warm up before doing intense intervals. Depending on the max speed of your treadmill you might be able to do some short sprints on that and I guess your exercise bike too if the resistance isn't set too high.

I wouldn't recommend mroe than 2 sprint sessions a week and since you probably sprint a lot playing soccer one is maybe more realistic - just make it a good one.

You'd already know Scrap's threads are good for stretches.

You can work the bags in a similar way. You might have short, hard rounds on your bag to really get your heart rate up with timed rests.

You will find that with pushups and boxing etc you use and strenthen your chest muscles a lot. To counterbalance that you will need to put some emphasis on your back when you do weights. It will also help to keep you from developing a hunched posture which will make your stomach look fattier than it really is.

Chin ups are great for your back plus some light dumbell exercises - on hands and knees, dumbell in one hand and raise laterally and return in a controlled fashion to feel the muscles right in the middle of your back. Light weight is best otherwise you use the wrong muscles which won't really help your posture.

You might want to check out the bodyweight exercises thread that Hitmanddony put up - there are heaps of good exercises in there.

I'd also do a search on plyometrics because they'd be great for your soccer to I imagine. You just need to make sure you have a safe surface for plyometrics and skipping. Doing those exercises on normal floors WILL damage you. You'll get shin splints and potentially back problems - i knew a guy who had to stop boxing for a while because he fractured his back this way! It sucked for him because he'd just won a national junior title and was doing really well!

If you don't have sprung floorboards you might be able to pick up some rubber matting made for this purpose somewhere.