Boxing/Martial Arts

Does anybody have experience w any of these?

I have been lifting weights for some time now and believe I can start, it was one of the reasons i started lifting. I now have a base to begin learning more skills.

I originally wanted to learn basic boxing skills and then transition into bare-knuckle boxing. But it's hard bc there's no bare-knuckle classes bc its illegal and I cant form a group, bc people are skeptical of it.

Does anybody do boxing? Can a beginner (only been in street fights, non competition) just walk into a boxing gym and go to a class? If it were a class, i would want a boxing ring with real opponents and learn basics.

And I started considering martial arts, but i dont know much about it, if anybody has experience?

Also, kickboxing, which need to work on my legs for about a month or 2 more. But thats popular in my area.

 

I've boxed a little but I have way more experience with Martial Arts. Are you training to get in shape, compete or for actual self defense?

 

Just self defense. And I guess a little get in shape, I already am though.

Mainly self defense

 

Dude definitely jump right in and do some kickboxing or boxing. Often these are bag classes rather than sparring so you can get an awesome workout and build your technique. I would be more apt to recommend boxing first before getting into lifting. Jumping into heavy weights first before doing the martial arts can be counter productive because you can create imbalanced muscle groups. And weights really dont help technique. I switched over to kickboxing because awesome workout great dynamic stretching (my lower body has always felt like shit cause i had no flexibility). Ive lost weight and toned significantly having only clocked 25 hours so far. I still do the gym for some focused workouts or when travelling.
Since you want to do the mma style thing I would say you should really start with kickboxing and/or martial arts classes first limiting sparring and doing technique and bag exercises to first build endurance. I am a hockey player and going into muay thai sparring without building a good boxing endurance was just a waste of an hour.

 

Also, bare knuckle boxing sounds majorly stupid especially if untrained. The hands have a lot of bones and are very fragile... It takes technique and lots of bone and small muscle stengthing to get to a point where you can punch someone in the skull with decent force and not threaten to break your hand significantly. Punching with a fist is actually not that great in a fight regardless due to this fact which is why lots of martial arts teach hitting with the side or bottom palm of the hand or elbows and knees

Good workout

 

Good. It really doesn't take too long to put together a suitable skill set for self defense but its tough to find good training and theres really no place to learn it in one shot. I left all of the traditional martial arts dojos almost as soon as I began as it was pretty obvious early on that I wasnt going to learn anything of value for self defense. I did Muay Thai for a few years and BJJ for one. I liked Muay Thai but the instructors were MMA coaches and didnt spend any time on the self defense applications.

I liked Kali and Silat as they spent alot of time on weapon use, empty hand weapon defense, multiple attackers, navigating uncontrolled environments and other concepts that MMA excludes.

Its really important to identify what types of skills you want to develop and spar with guys that do them well. I've had alot of proper training but, if you found the right group, you would probably learn more in a fight club or a good sparring meetup.

 

I can agree with this though my earlier post were suggesting the opposite not have seeing the comment about wanting to focus on defense. A lot of gyms start with the focus on offense, proper form and comfort is important here because any strike will often put you at a defensive disadvantage so you need to be quick and balanced. If you have this down you should just reach out tonseveral gyms for a trial session and define what you want as your focus and theyll let you know where they can help.

 

All martial arts classes provide you with tools but in my experience, they don't teach you how to apply the tools in a practical effective manner. MMA techniques can be adapted for all types of combat but most of these classes are taught by straight up sportsman who never applied these techniques in combat or never made combat applications their focus at any point.

I keep it on the feet if possible but BJJ does have usefullness if things go to the ground. Most of the people I've trained with have never rolled on, grass, sand, tile, concrete or asphault. The physics are different for each surface and will change your whole game tremendously. You try to pull an arm back or do certain sweeps your risk shattering your arm or busting your cerebral cortex. Sand and grass gives and makes it impossible to shrimp. Shriming on asphault will scrape the top 2 layers of skin off your back. If you try to use BJJ for self defense without practicing on real surfaces that shit will fail in real life.

Boxing and Muay Thai are more suitable but they are still ring sports that dont address multiple attackers and weapons. Niether my Muay Thai or boxing coaches taught me how to hit someone when my hands are unwrapped with no glove. You can sock the shit out of Andre the Giant when youre wearing wrapps and 16s. If you hit someone bare knuckle and you land improperly, youll shatter your hands.

I know people who have been studying MMA and traditional for years and these points have never even crossed their minds. Its good to go in and get some basic techniques but dont be drinking the koolaid.

 

One of the fighting gyms I go to breaks it up with muay thai as sparring training and kickboxing/muay thai hybrid heavy bag workouts.
Muay thai and boxing, if taught right I think are great starting points if you actually get into a fight as they teach hand position and protecting oneself when attacking while also the footwork. I did tae kwan do for a bit which addressed attacking without wraps or gloves, but idk what level it starts to focus on defensw side.

 

yeah, well that's the point. Bare knuckle boxing requires alot of skill, and in self defense youre most likely only going to have your hands. Also bare knuckle is mostly body shots vs heads shots. But its illegal anyways.



Thanks for the input everybody