Tube Boxing ROCKS!.....

jude666

This weekend the hubby and I travelled to Peterborough to try out a new boxing workout called "Tube Boxing". The name itself doesn't give much away. And no, you're not fighting each other with different sized tubes (as one of my friends suggested!).

Tube Boxing has been developed by a couple fitness instructors, specifically trained in boxing. It is designed to allow people of a fair level of fitness to have a full body workout primarily based on.....well to put it the simplest way.... beating the hell out of different sized boxing bags!!! If you enjoy circuit training and love to try something new for a change, this could be right up your street.

There were approximately 12 of us when we arrived at the (rather chilly) industrial unit. We were immediately assured that you would not be feeling the cold for very long and they were definitely right about that!

After a brief but rather effective warm-up session involving everybody, our group of 12 was suddenly split into two teams. Hubby and I stuck together (the whimps that we are!) and joined the team starting out on the "stretch wall", a row of 6 different on-the-spot exercises involving elasticated ropes, allowing you to stretch just that little bit further! For example, my first exercised involved me dropping to my hands and knees, slotting my feet into the loops and hold a plank position for as long as possible (2 mins max). I wasn't unfamiliar with the plank position having come across that little beaut of an exercise in my adventures with Jillian Michaels! This hurt a lot more though, it was a good pain but you knew you were going to feel it in the morning! I am proud to say, out of our group of 6, my hubby (who has an obscene amount of upper body strength) managed to hold the plank position for the whole 2 minutes! Mainly coz i told him he wasn't allowed to stop until the 2 minutes were up! :laugh: (have to be cruel to be kind you see!)

After the grueling stretch exercises were up, feeling suitably streched and sweaty, we moved on to the moment we had been waiting for! The Boxing!!!! Inside the industrail unit there was a tube like construction containing 12 different sized boxing bags. The "tube" was lit up like a night club with the music to match. It looked exciting and I was very pumped to try it out. Donning our rather glamorous (and well used - Eeeeuw!!) boxing gloves, our instructions were "when the music is pumping and the lights are flashing - you go for it" and "when the lights are blue and the music is chilled - you chill and then move on to the next bag" SIMPLES!

Having not had any boxing experience before I was kinda wondering how this was going to look to the outside, am I actually going to be strong enough to move the bags? Or am I going to do the classic - hit the bag and have it swing back and punch me in the face!! I swore if that was going to happen to anyone... it would happen to me (and the hubby agreed!)

Well... the music started and away we went.... !!!!!......suddenly.....the boxing champion-of-champions within little ole me was unleashed in full flight and I punched that bag like I had never (well I haven't ever) punched before!! Before I knew it, the 2 minutes was up and the music chilled. We all moved on to the next bag, hopping around on the floor whilst we waited as if we were auditioning for Rocky and then we felt the beat go "three... two.... one....." and off we went again. 2 minutes in my own little boxing champion world, hopping from side to side, left punch, right punch - even managed a few kicks! (ouch!). I can honestly say I have never enjoyed any workout as much as I enjoyed this one - nor have I sweated so much during exercise or felt so pumped up!

We had a brief one to one session each whilst we did a quick fire round - same as before but 1 minute on, 30 secs off this time and then when we'd got to a certain point, we were with the instructor punching into her hands - left hook, right hook, hold... left hook, right hook, hold... a couple of pointers from the instructor and BASH!!! A punch suddenly came from nowhere so loud, hard and straight that I thought my fist could have gone through her hand! The instructor looked pleased as punch and asked whether I had ever done this before as it certainly looked that way - this spurned me on even more and three perfect punches followed.... BASH BASH BASH!!!!!

The session enevitably finished with a cool down - and boy did we need it. I was gutted when it finished, especially on learning the next one won't be until just before Xmas! I will definitely be back though, so will my hubby.

One draw back though.... waking up yesterday morning, I actually felt like my body was paralysed! I hurt in places i never knew i had muscles. I know they say no pain no gain... but blimey! Even my hubby who is a professional gardener and can burn 5,000 calories in a day and with the upper body strength of a machine... couldn't even pull up his trousers without assistance!!! We laughed it all off (which hurt even more) but swore we would return, the survival of the fittest.

I would recommend this workout to EVERYONE! Look out for a Tube Boxing Arena near you!!!!

Nikki582

Oh if that comes to my area I'm SO doing it.