Boxing, dabbling with a new martial art

Here's a quick story of how a late 50s guy ends up in a new type (for him)  of gym.  Also, as you can see in the top video (round 1), how much fun it is to use the slow motion option on my iphone to see what I actually do.

Boxing Gym

I spent 8 pretty happy years in the martial arts at a blended school (nee Lavallees, now Elite Force) which taught a mix of kickboxing, kempo, muy thai and whatever else they chose to integrate. It was great fun, a great crowd, and great for me.

Happy Days at the Dojo

At some point, my kids had moved on and my hip movement became increasing constrained reducing what I could do and more importantly, making kicking drills detrimental to my back. I stuck it out for two years past when my back could handle the martial arts trying to work-around the ongoing  back problems. Finally, I sadly put my gi on the shelf and have been trying to figure out what to do next for sports ever since.

Rebuilding at Focus Studio

Nicole of Focus: She rebuilt e

You've seen (if you've been reading) that I've spent six months in acute physical therapy, around nine months with a a very tuned-in trainer trying to continue to rebuild core strength while improving my diet and exercise regime to get to a better percent body fat/lean muscle ration (thanks Nicole of Focus Studio), and then this summer, I did a trio of  triathalons culminating with me making it onto the podium after a race. Ironically, that seems to have resulted in a drop in motivation for me in that area. Or maybe I just got bored since I always train solo and it's just very dull.

All of this by way of explaining that I'm now dabbling in boxing.  I have a two tier approach to this. One is that I go to another yuppy gym where there is a boxing fitness class. There's bags and drills and some intense guys and gals, some socializing,  but no sparing. I like the classes particularly since they are close to the house and they have classes 7:45-8:30 in the morning which works well for me.


The other tier is that I've been going to a boxing gym which is on the other side of the tracks (literally and figuratively, which gives me a chance to link to one of my favorite cartoonists).  Luis, who runs those classes, takes me to his gym-in-a-warehouse where he matches me up with guys somewhere near my age, dize, and skill level to spar.  Very exciting and definitely something different..

The real excitement and activity in this gym is about the kids (late teens, early 20s) who are trying to compete at the amateur or professional level as boxers.  Here's what the gym looks like (15 second video)

 Here's what one of the rounds looks like (It's not pretty but I figure this is a base case that I can work.


 up from....)

 



 I got a little tired, here I am between rounds being told to stop dancing and running and to try some boxing. Good advice. I told myself that too. But I couldn't seem to settle down that day...


 





Yes, we did do three rounds. I had handed my phone to someone to film and at the end, there's only two rounds recorded. Of course, I was so much better in the missing round.  Isn't it always that way?