Boxing

[duptyfied 0]

Muay Thai may be the sport for street fighting but the sport that teaches you endurance even in the face of sheer punishment is boxing.

 

 

In India boxing is largely on a Armature scale and not much at a professional level because India is glued to no other sport as it is to cricket. The boxers here are good but there is not much scope for an Indian boxer to take his skills from a sport to a profession in the ring.

 

To give you a little hands on knowledge on the sport: there are only two boxing stance i.e. Orthodox and Southpaw. The Orthodox boxer will in most cases be a right handed person; he will therefore throw his left first in timed and repeated succession, followed by his right. Similarly Southpaw boxers are in most cases left handers, who will take a stance to throw their right first in timed and repeated succession, followed by their left. The weaker hand is thrown first, backed by upper body weight, this is known as the jab and after a volley of these jabs the boxer makes his statement by delivering from his strong hand a blow that is powered by a twist from the hips along with follow through of upper body weight. Also a boxer will always tuck his chin because a good punch to the chin will knock him out. Cuts and hooks are delivered by swinging the elbow along with the torso and landing the blow with the forearm in line with the wrist and perpendicular to the target area.

 

Footwork is extremely important for a boxer, how you move into and out of your opponent’s attack area determines how much beating you can deliver and how much you can elude. In boxing there are three things you need to work on: stamina, speed and strength. Stamina is what will keep you in the ring, speed is correlated and helps deliver more blows, which is again determined by stamina. Strength is the icing on the cake but by itself it is of little value.

 

To me the best boxer right up to now is still Teofilo Stevenson of Cuba, three time heavyweight Olympic gold medalist in succession. The statement he made when refused a $5 million deal to challenge the then champion Mohamed Ali, shows he valued his country and people more than money and pride, this is what he said: "What is one million dollars compared to the love of eight million Cubans?”. To me he was not only a better boxer but also a better person.