Wanting to get into shape - heavy bag boxing workout

[CHokKA]

Hey everyone

I am wanting to get back into shape. I haven't been very good to myself and my weight has got to a point where I really need to do something about it. I am starting to eat more healthily, but my main issue is that I just don't exercise. I have a heavy bag setup in my garage, I used to use it years ago. Last night I started using it again. I did 25 minutes on the heavy bag, moving around a lot and only stopping for a minutes break every 6 minutes. I am sore this morning, but understandably so because it is actually quite a rigorous workout. After the 25 minutes I do about 10 - 15 minutes of other weights. I will also add in stomach crunches but I decided not to add too much into last nights workout because I didn't want to hurt myself after the first session back to it after a few years. I also plan on cycling in the evenings on alternate nights, so my heavy bag workout will be 25 minutes in the evening along with weights and stomach crunches on Monday, Wednesday and Friday, and then Tuesday, Thursday, and weekends I'll cycle for about 30 - 45 minutes. I'm hoping that this will be a decently rounded workout routine which will help me lose the weight around my stomach.

My question to the fitness peeps here is how does this sound to you? Can I expect to lose weight at a steady pace by doing this?

Many thanks!

 

[CHokKA]

It sounds like a domestic version of that new craze of "Body Combat" classes... it will work, to a point.

You will carry on dropping bodyfat, but without a progressive weights routine you won't keep much shape. If you consider your heavy bag work as cardio, you should add in weights to support muscle maintenance. I'd suggest heavy bag 2/3 days a week and then a structured weights routine straight after (i.e. 20 minutes bag work, 20/30 minutes weights).

Regardless, good work on starting up again - good luck on the journey, and we're here to help!

Thanks for your post mrthingyx. As you've correctly highlighted, I'm treating the heavy bag workout as cardio. I just wanted to know from those who know whether it is an intense form of cardio. I do feel pretty tired after it, and I know it is helping my agility and upper body strength as well which is why I like doing it. I'm not a runner, I can cycle so that for the other form of cardio in between the heavy bag workouts would be my preferred choice. I'll have a look around at weights routines to find something suitable for me

I don't want to go at the weights so I become huge, I just want to be fairly well built and healthy

 

[CHokKA]

Last year I managed to get myself into a pretty bad state of health due to living on a diet of eating whatever I wanted.. whenever I wanted.

Got up to 17.5 Stone and a waistline of 40".

So.. I decided to shake it up myself.

Started eating healthy..

1. Breakfast is Porridge.
2. I eat a small amount of pasta at 10am.
3. Lunch at work is Pasta or a Quorn Burger (I am veggie).
4. Pre workout, about 2 hours before, I eat more pasta or rice.
5. Post work out I have a protein shake.
6. Tea, always before 7PM, is mainly ortien based with as little carbs as possible.

I dumped soft drinks (when not socialising) and have kept chocolate and crisps to an absolute minimum.

At the gym I started doing the following:

1. 30 Mins Incline Interval on a treadmil, 2 mins running at about 5.5Mph, 2 mins walking at 3.5Mph.
2. 15 Mins hill training on the exercise bike.
3. 3 sets of 500M on the rowing machine, trying to keep the time under 2 minutes at a resistance level of 0. I finish with 1000m as quick as I can.

I then move onto the boxing bags, they have 4 types, I do 3 mins on each bag with one minutes rest. I do both punching and kicking. I finish with one final round of 3 minutes on the softest bag using kicks only.
I then do 5 - 10 minutes of kicking technique work.

On a Monday and Tuesday I follow this with BJJ, Wednesday I follow it with Kick Boxing.

I do this 4 times a week, (Mon, Tues, Wed, Fri) with Kickxing for 2 hours on a Thursday and Sunday.

This resulted in me dropping 3.5 stones in pretty much 10 weeks.

Its all about determination and eating right.. push yourself.

One thing I did learn was that you need to feed your body, at one point I was only eating 800 cals per day whilst doing all this.. I did drop a lot of weight but I didn't feel good!

Thanks for sharing. I will definitely look at feeding my body more whilst I start this up. I'm sore today but I feel rather good I'm just about to have a banana, and then for lunch I'll probably have a pasta salad

 

[CHokKA]

I forgot to add to my original post that I go for a brisk walk for about 20 - 30 minutes on my lunch hour as well. I know it's not the most optimal fitness regime but it's all exercise, and with an 18-month old boy it's the best I can fit in right now

 

[CHokKA]

Why do people think that going at weights will make them huge? Particularly if weightloss is their objective?

Getting "huge" actually requires a truly enormous, dedicated and concerted effort over an extended period of time (months and years)... it doesn't just happen by lifting weights.

If you're bag training, too, you'll want better core strength, so check out something like Stronglifts.

I know that, that's what I was trying to highlight. I was trying to explain that I'm just going easy with the weights because my lifestyle doesn't allow me to spend hours doing them, and that my goal is to get healthy and toned, not to build loads of muscle. I only have about an hour in the evening to do the heavy bag workout and then weights, so I was just trying to explain that my weight routine needs are rather simple I'm sorry if it came across incorrectly, I'm very new to all of the theory behind it all but I do know that I'd have to dedicate a lot to getting lots of muscle