boxing routine for weight gain and muscle growth

[vinganca]

For boxers that want to go up a weightclass I made a little workout routine on how to build muscle without losing speed nor endurance.

Before I show the workout I want to explain why I devised it this way: weight gain and strenght gain go hand in hand. If you go from ten pushups at 70 kilos to ten pushups at 90 kilos you have succesfully gotten stronger and more muscular!

The biggest issue we have when going up a weightclass is to not lose our precious athleticism, hence why the most important thing to do is working out in a way where you focus most on the aspects of athleticism that are disadvantaged by weight gain!

Gaining weight and quality muscle simply comes down to two things: 1. Any type of resistance training including calisthenics 2. Bulking and cutting to gain weight while keeping your fat percentage low

So! Here comes the warm up!

10 to 15 minutes of shadowboxing followed by two 50 yard sprints or uphill sprints! 2 one or two legged hops for 50 yards! And two 50 yards backward sprints or backwards up a hill! After each 50 yards, walk back and go back to sprinting once you have returned to your starting point. This way you can build up speed when you are at your freshest and keep your athletic ability at an all-time high!

Workout A: we will start with a circuit type training. Every exercise you will do for one minute before moving on to the next. You can do either one, two or three rounds depending on your cardio levels.

1. One handed push ups! Great unilateral training! If doing them on the ground is too hard, do them on a bench or against a countertop! With this and every exercise after this counts one thing! Try to be as quick and explosive as possible without injury!
2. One handed bodyweight rows! Great unilateral training aswell! Make sure to get those obliques firing for rotational power!
3. Switch lunges! Left leg first, jump switch to right leg, jump switch back!
4. One armed push shrugs! In plank position, pull your shoulders back, then push them forward! Also do this on one arm at a time! This trains the serratus aka the boxer's muscle. Heavily overlooked but super important for power output!
5. Dragonflag progression! Lay with your back on the ground while holding onto something above your head! Now raise your legs and butt of the floor to your feet are as high in the air as possible! Raising your feet first will make the exercise easier to do!
6. One legged hamstring bridge! Lay your foot and preferably also your upper torso on an elevation. Push off with your foot and bring your hips up as if you are running!
7. Twist burn out! Twist your body so when you punch with your left you punch to you right and when you punch with your right you punch to your left!
8. Speedy hops! For 30 seconds jump to the left and right of a vertical line with one leg. Next 30 seconds do it with the other!
9. Punch burn out! While running in place, throw as many punches as your can for the duration!
10. Sprawls! Instead of the burpee, you lower your hips to the ground before getting back up again for the jump!
11. Speed ladder! Step both feet in front of an imaginary horizontal line, the behind, back in front, rinse repeat.
12. The wombo combo! As last exercise we will to a combination of movements! Step forward, step back, weave and step left, weave and step right, pivot left, pivot right, switch stance (regular to soutpaw, southpaw to regular) and repeat all while throwing a jab or cross.

Workout B: also a circuit workout but more focused on footwork! While workout A makes sure that our strength and strength endurance stays the same or improves relatively to our bodyweight, workout B is more so focused on footwork! Weighing more will make it much more taxing on our legs to move around and stay nimble. Hence workout B is much more focused on our sweet little legs!

1. Wall ups! Start on hands and feet with your feet closest to a wall. Walk up the wall with your feet to a handstand position and back down!
2. Bench ups! Stand in push up position in front of a bench, place your hands one by one on the bench, then back down. Every rep start with a different hand. Place the bench far away enough so this becomes more of a lat exercise!
3. Split squat uppercuts! Put yourself in the position for a bulgarian split squat. Now lower yourself right before your knee touches the ground, and from there you will throw an uppercut coming from the same side as the leg in front of you! Switch legs after 30 seconds.
4. Superman plank! Put yourself in a push up position, lift your left hand in front of you and your right leg of the ground. Lower them and do it to the other side. Rinse, repeat!
5. Core crazyness! Step in low with a jab to the body, step back, sprawl, switch stance, repeat.
6. Sit in your stance! Sit on a chair, get up, throw a 1 2 combo, switch stance, sit back down!
7. Bob and weave baby! Pivot to the right while ducking under a punch. Throw a right hook to the face, right hook to the body. Switch stance! Do the same on your left!
8. Square up! Keeping your guard high, step forward, left, back, right ducking under a punch each time! Followed by an uppercut exploding from the ground and a hook!
9. Stepping mastery! Step in with jab, step in with hook, step back with cross, step back with hook, pendulum step, switch stance!
10. Level up! Jab followed by cross to the body and uppercut from the ground up! Switch stance, repeat! Whenever you throw a punch to the body, make sure to lower your level aswell so you can really power up the next strike!
11. Hook burn out! Throw as many hooks as you can in a minute!
12. Uppercut burn out! While running in place, throw as many uppercuts as you can in a minute!

When this is done I recommend going for a jog if you don't jog otherwise! Followed by a yoga routine once you come home! Yoga is way more important then you think, the stability and flexibity it builds in your lower AND upper body is of vital importance for fluid boxing movements! To be athletic you need to train muscles you wouldn't otherwise in ways you wouldn't otherwise think off! While I would also recommend doing neckexercises, make sure to see a doctor or professional before attempting that!

Your diet should ofcourse have enough clean protein and complex carbs for healthy weight gain. If you notice that your performance is slowing down, try to slow down or temporarily halt your weightgain! It is important to build quality muscle and allow your body to keep up with the demand! If you are putting on too much fat, you can temporarily lose some weight to be more on track before returning to your bulk.

Although to build muscle people usually recommend weightlifting, calisthenics has proven time and time again to be sufficient for most people! Allowing you to enjoy boxing and look good doing it!

For this training routine to work you can either decide to do two workouts a week, one each. Or switch them up with a rest day in between each workout adding up to 3 or 4 workouts a week! Do whatever fits best for you! So you can still fit in your actual boxing aswell!

If this exercise routine is too easy for you! You can always add in a weighted vest for extra difficulty!