7 Tips for The Perfect Heavy Bag Workout

It can be easy to fall into the same old routine with your heavy bag workout. You may sometimes feel that you are just punching away, falling into the same patterns? Now there’s nothing wrong with punching away on the heavy bag, but there are some things you can try that will take your heavy bag work up a notch. The great thing is, these tips to improve your heavy bag work also apply to your shadow boxing – it’s a win win!

The 7 Tips for a Great Heavy Bag Workout

Tip #1 – Duration

Don’t just settle for 3 minute rounds with 1 minute rest periods when working the heavy bag. You can mix things up. For example, change your rest period down to 30 seconds. This will put more pressure on you to focus on your recovery in between the hard work of the bag round. You can also lost the rest periods totally – try a 15 minute heavy bag round, steady work, with no rest periods. This will help you with the skill of active recovery (recovering whilst punching and moving).

Tip #2 – Use the Heavy Bag for Range

The heavy bag is fantastic for giving you a feel for range. Range finding is important at all stages of your boxing development, but it’s one of the difficulties for beginners to build. Use the swing of the heavy bag to help you time your jabs and crosses, moving in and out in time with the swing of the bag. You will get that feel, down to the inch, where you are in relation to the heavy bag. This translates perfectly when facing a live opponent.

Tip #3 – Make Punches Come Back

Always remember that live opponents punch back! When working the heavy bag, make it a live opponent. Build feints into your work, block imaginary punches coming back your way and move your head before and after punches. This approach will ensure that you are instilling all of the skills of boxing into your style, it will help you execute those skills instinctively. Becoming instinctive in your fighting is critical, and your heavy bag workout can be a great way to do this (as well as your shadow boxing).

Tip #4 – Non Punching Contact

When up close, think about the stuff that you can do that doesn’t involve punching. You can dip your head into the heavy bag. You can use your shoulder to barge the heavy bag into a good punching position. You can push the bag off with your forearm, again to create space or to pin the ‘arms’ of the opponent whilst you let your punches go.

Tip #5 – Impose Range Conditions

Consciously manage your range when using the heavy bag. You can work at long range, using subtle footwork skills like the pendulum step to switch from edge of range to long range. Use pivots and side steps to open up angles to deliver straight punches and longer range hooks and uppercuts. Similarly you can stick at close range, using damaging hooks and uppercuts and all of that non-punching contact that we’ve covered. Top it off by shifting from long range to close range and back again.

Tip #6 – Impose Punching Conditions

Mix things up in your heavy bag workout by applying punching conditions. You could try volume conditions, throwing no less than x number of punches in a combination during a give round, or a minute of the round. You can shift from single pot shots to 5 and 6 punch combinations. You can also place conditions on the power. For example, 80% of the punches you throw are at 80% power, and 20% of punches are at 100% power. Dropping your punching power a bit will help you maintain correct technique and form.

Tip #7 – Emulate a Fighter

Have some fun and emulate your favourite fighter. One of my favourites to emulate is Marvelous Marvin Hagler. Hagler is one of my all time favourites, and when you analyse the Marvelous Marvin boxing style you realise there’s bunch of fun to be had. You could go with Rocky Marciano, making sure that every punch is delivered with 100% power. Or you could go with a totally different style, maybe Dmitry Bivol or Oleksandr Usyk. Then options are literally endless, so who are you going to go with for your next heavy bag workout?

So there we have it, 7 tips to take your heavy bag workout to the next level. Give it some thought and let me have any ideas you have below.

Cheers

Fran

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