Month: April 2011

Do Work Son

With all the equipment in check, I attended to the task of doing work. Every day I followed a ritual which soon matured:

1. As the sun begins to set I slide on my shoes (no socks), wrap my hands and put on a hoodie
2. Drink 20 ounces of water, fill another 20 ounces and bring it outside
3. Lay the gloves/water on a wheelbarrow filled with wood next to the bag
4. Untie the tarp and throw it aside
5. 10 minutes of fucking around/stretching/light punches without gloves
6. Gloves on, headphones on, 1st track is for a warm-up of slow, basic cross jab combinations
7. As the 2nd track starts start going at full force, doing complex combinations with precise footwork
8. When i’m near to my “target heart rate” begin extremely rapid inside body shots to fully gas out, followed by immediate return to power punch combinations
9. Drink when necessary, take short breaks in between “sets” of powerful combinations
10. Work until I can no longer raise my arms (30-45 minutes) or until i’m out of water
11. Cool down involving hugging the bag/light punching/headphones off and drinking
12. Putting the tarp back on, wrapping it around and tying it tight

I found that after my first few sessions that I would become distracted while working out, and my motivation was wavering. So I decided to try to use music. In the past when I lifted weights I would always perform better when listening to good music, and figured it might also enhance boxing. I’m lucky to say it did, and I only work the bag with music now. I use music as a workout plan: when its a fill or a chorus I do combination work, and when there is a fast or riffing part I drop down and do rapid body shots or throw hooks off both legs as fast as I can.

Beginnings

I recently got back into boxing and wanted to share some thoughts for people who are considering getting into the game. My interest in boxing stems from my recreational study of martial arts, which started when I was still in elementary school and turned into quite a hobby by the time I was in high school. During my earliest years karate had an explosion in the United States and it seemed like karate studios were opening everywhere. I was not interested in such nonsense, the styles seemed ineffectual and memorizing some katas to be given a belt without qualifying one’s fighting ability seemed ostentatious at best. Regardless, I became a huge fan of Sanda, Muay Thai and eventually Sambo, Brazilian Jiu Jitsu and Judo. I used to watch the K-1 tournaments all the time with my best friend, and from there eventually started watching PRIDE and Pancrase championships, which were the precursors of such giants such American inventions as UFC. I consider combat to be the greatest sport of all, and there is no greater test of an athlete’s character and ability. It was especially interesting to examine what was effective, and what was not. Karate and Tae Kwon Do were especially unsuitable for real combat, while it seemed the boxers (be they Thai or Western) dominated the field. Eventually I bought some gloves and Thai pads and from time to time would work them with my friend, but he soon had to move away to school or otherwise was physically distant and I fell out of practice for about three years.

It was much to my pleasant surprise that I learned of Fallen from an acquaintance. I had followed the rebirth of Burzum closely and listened to and studied Belus but had fallen out of current developments in recent months. While I thought Belus was a good album, it just didn’t compare to the majesty and spiritual power of an album like Filosofem. That being said, Fallen is a return to more introspective, emotionally charged and philosophical works of yore, but still remains married to a deep concept of Indo-European mythological themes.  I think this is the perfect area for Burzum, as was shown in Filosofem, and where Varg Vikernes really excels creatively. While Belus was essentially a story telling album, a celebration in Nordic mythological concepts, it in some ways was lacking in pure emotional immediacy and technical experimentation, instead sounding like an imitation of the earliest Burzum forms. And who can blame Varg? Being restricted from his music for so long, I’m sure the psychic chorus of sound in his jailed mind naturally was an outgrowth of musics from fifteen years ago, and much like a debater finding a clear hole in an opponent’s argument, he could not wait to spit out the thing burning at his chest.