Shoulder Exercises

Significance Of The Shoulders

The first time I ever worked the heavy bag, I was already expecting that I was going to get tired pretty quickly. What I didn’t expect though, was that the biggest feeling of fatigue and pain was at the shoulders, before the legs or even the arms. It took me quite a long time to truly minimise the feeling of soreness and heaviness at the shoulders that you get from holding your guard up and punching for long periods of time. Having endurance in your shoulders is essential for maintaining your form when you enter the later rounds of the boxing match. Fail to do so, and your punches will lose power, snap, and speed, and your guard will become weak and assailable. So not only is it important for your offence, it’s especially important for having a good defence. Adopting shoulder exercises of variety consistently, will strengthen and increase endurance in the shoulders, and here we will go into some detail about how you can go about achieving this:

Strengthening the shoulders involves having your arms in a particular position, to encourage expansions and contractions in the back and shoulder areas to encourage fatigue to increase condition. To start off, each particular exercise will be performed for 30 seconds to make up a 3 minute round, at which you can take a 1 minute break.

Mini circles – Fully extend your arms straight and complete small circular motions. First, hold your arms out forward, directly in front of you, and make the circular motions for thirty seconds. Next, hold your arms out to the side horizontally and complete the circular motions in 30 seconds. Make sure you try to keep your arms from lowering as time goes by. Then after 30 seconds, hold your arm upwards (directly vertical) and again do the same small circular motions.

L Shape Switches – Take your left arm and place it out directly in front of you parallel to the ground, then take your right arm and put it up vertically pointing to the ceiling. Then switch your arms so that now your left arm is up and your right is horizontal, and keep switching for 30 seconds. Make sure that when rising your arm vertically, you move it fully back instead off only partially.

Pump outs – This involves having your arm at right angle and fully extending your arm out. Firstly, have your arms out directly in front of you (make sure your arms aren’t held downwards). Then bring your arms to your chest, but as you do so, bring your elbows up so that they are pointing horizontally. After 30 seconds, change and point your arms upwards, and do the same extensions for 30 seconds. Next up, do the same thing but downwards. However as you do so, bend your knees and slightly bend your back and lean forward. This will make your upper back and shoulder muscles to work more. Complete for 30 seconds.

Roll ups – With your arms in the standard position when you normally stand, bring your hands to your shoulders, forcing your elbows out to the side. Complete for thirty seconds.

Tricep extensions – Hold your arms together upwards vertically, then bend your elbows so that you touch your back with your fists. Immediately, extend your arms so that your arms are now back pointing upwards. Repeat for 30 seconds.

Switches – With your arms held upwards, fist pointing to the sky, bring both arms out to the side so that are now pointing horizontally and are parallel to the ground. Bring your arms back up and repeat the process for thirty seconds. Next, start with your arms pointing forward and horizontally and then bring them directly up so they are now pointing vertically. Bring it back down and then repeat the exercise for another thirty seconds. After, put your arms by your side so that they are facing the floor, and then bring them up and point them so that they are now pointing sideways.

Shadowboxing – Punch Outs

One of the most effective ways to build up shoulder endurance is to simply shadowbox, and throw punch-outs directly in front of you. In order for it to be effective, punch in front of you consistently (without  taking breaks between punches). However, do not punch downwards. Make sure it is directly horizontal, if not at a slightly upwards angle. One alternative is to punch directly in front of you for thirty seconds, and then punch at an upwards diagonal angle for thirty seconds. Repeat for a full round.

Improving

To improve your should endurance steadily and consistently, aim to complete shoulder exercises at least 3-5 times a week. Spend 2 rounds (6 minutes) using various exercises from the categories above, and as time goes on, try to increase the amount of rounds you do, to about 6. As your endurance improves, you can gradually decrease the break time, increase the length of each exercise (30-40-50-60 seconds etc), and the length of the round (3-4-5 minutes etc). As time goes on, you will also increase the speed in which you complete each motion, to complete more reps.

Weights

After a few sessions of doing the shoulder exercises with no weights, the next step will be to do so with the addition of weights. Start off with 0.5kg weights, and then build up to 3-5kg. You can go further, but be wary that doing so may build up excessive mass in the muscles which may slow you down. Staying at around 3kg is sufficient enough, especially if you are increasing the duration of the exercises as you build up. When you build up the weight, decrease the time to avoid overdoing it. Alternate sessions between using heavier and lighter weights.

Final Note From Reemus – Are They Doing It?

                Always keep in mind, champions are the fighters that strive towards putting in more hours than the other fighters. As a champion-in-training, entering the ring without being in peak condition is unacceptable and every aspect of their physique is not excluded from being developed and strengthened. The monotony of shoulder exercise will most likely ensure that the competition will skip out on fully investing time towards doing this properly. This is your golden opportunity to make the difference between you and the others.