The Best Exercises for the Punch Bag for Weight Loss

By Kasim Javed Punchbags

Punching bags are a great piece of exercise equipment as you can relieve mental stress while getting involved in a great workout. While the training can be a fun physical activity to introduce into your day-to-day life, training on a punch bag is a great way to lose weight when paired with a healthy diet.

Let’s look at the best ways to lose weight with a punching bag and how to train safely, so you can keep training for longer.

Can You Lose Weight With a Punching Bag?

Punching bags are a great way to lose weight as they engage your whole body when training. Many people mistakenly believe punching bags are just about arm strength, but you don’t have to have large biceps to use them, and you need to engage your whole body to punch effectively.

When training with a free-standing punching bag, for example, you need to move around the bag to place your punches, shifting your weight from foot to foot and moving your body into defensive and attacking positions. Then as you strike the bag, you’re generating your power from your rear foot and moving it through your body as you twist on the ball of your foot and turn your hips to strike with your leading hand, before returning to your defensive stance or striking again with your opposite hand.

However, while boxing training engages many different muscle groups, to lose weight training with a punching bag, you need to eat a healthy balanced diet. By ensuring you’re eating a healthy number of calories for your size and sex (women are advised to eat around 2000 calories a day, while men are recommended around 2500 calories a day), you’re more likely to lose weight, as you need to be in calorie deficit to use up the energy in your existing fat and reduce your body’s fat stores.

By losing fat, you’ll be losing weight, and by eating a balanced diet and exercising, you’ll be toning your muscles, getting stronger and you’ll start to see the difference in your appearance as you get into great shape.

Which is the Best Punching Bag for Weight Loss?

If you want to find the right punching bag to buy to help you lose weight, you should choose a heavier bag; a hanging punch bag or a free-standing punching bag is best. These bags are larger than most other punching bags so you can move around them and hit them as hard as you can. This will take up a lot of energy and effort, burn the most calories, and relieve mental stress.

Free-standing bags move less than hanging bags after your strikes, so they may be easier to use at home as you can train alone, without needing a friend or training partner to hold the bag, as you might with a hanging bag. What’s more, hanging bags need to be installed properly to be safe to use, but free-standing bags can be moved around as you wish to use them.

Training with a friend can be a huge benefit, however, especially if you’re trying to lose weight as you can encourage each other. Your children can also enjoy training with a punching bag with you and feel motivated to do sports. However, kids’ punching bags are lighter and smaller than adults’ and should be hung lower down the wall for comfort when training.

Children should never use adult boxing equipment as it isn’t designed for their size and may risk causing injury. So if you wish to train with your little ones as a motivation to get active, make sure they have the appropriate size equipment for them.

Best Exercises for the Punch Bag for Weight Loss

The best ways to lose weight with punching bags are to:

Warm up well to prevent injuries
Train in rounds and alternate your shots and combinations in each
Try kicking as well as punching
Integrate strength training exercises into your routine

By trying a mixture of these actions and exercises, you’ll develop a great training routine to help you lose weight while having fun.

Warm-Up and Stretch

It’s important to warm up before you start hitting the punching bag so you don’t end up hurting yourself and get your heart pumping harder to help with your weight loss journey. Jog, skip or do jumping jacks for five minutes to raise your heart rate and warm up your muscles. Then stretch your arms, legs and core to further reduce the risk of injury.

Do a similar cool down at the end of your workout to stop your muscles from aching due to lactic acid build-up as well.

Alternate Punches Each Boxing Round

There are three main punches in boxing:

Jab
Uppercut
Hook

Some people include the cross as an extra strike, but it’s the same as a jab but with the opposite hand.

When you first start training you’ll likely want to practise each shot one by one to help improve them, but when hitting a punch bag, the important thing is to maintain rhythm and momentum.

Start with 45-second rounds throwing jabs with alternate arms, returning your arm to its defensive position at your chin after each strike. Take a 15-second rest, and start another 45-second round, this time alternating between jabs and uppercuts with alternate arms. Repeat the routine with the opposite arms, before switching to jabs and hooks for your next round.

Focusing on just two punches at a time while maintaining your rhythm helps to keep you training for longer by maintaining your heart rate as you stay at a steady pace. Move around the bag as you strike it to engage your whole body further and burn more calories as well as improve your fighting technique. You can also use more of your body and increase your energy expenditure by kicking the punching bag.

Like punching, there are a few different kicking techniques you can try in combinations to improve your performance, balance, agility and fitness.

As you get better and fitter, you can increase your time hitting the bag up to 3 minutes each.

Add Strength Training Exercises

5 lots of 1-minute rounds after a 5-minute warm-up and with a 5-minute cool-down isn’t a lot of time spent on your feet, so to get more out of your training session and increase the time spent exercising, you can have a 5-minute circuit training session between 2 lots of 5-minute punching bag sessions to increase your total exercise time to 25 minutes of intense exercise.

Strength training exercises will help you build and tone muscle which will help your overall fighting performance and get you in better shape. Many people focus on the scales when they’re trying to lose weight, and while the numbers can be a helpful guide to show your progress, it’s easy to get stuck on the numbers and not focus on the way your body looks and how you feel.

By starting strength training, you may build muscle as well as lose fat, so you may not notice much difference on the scales. But don’t be disheartened. You’re sure to start feeling healthier and fitter, as well as notice your trousers are looser, your tummy is more toned and there’s less skin around your arms, thighs and back.

Useful strength training exercises to include in your exercise routine include:

Squats
Star jumps
Push-ups
Crunches
Pull-ups
Lunges
Burpees

Try each exercise for 30-45 seconds with a 15-second rest between each.

Train Safely with Your Punching Bag

Although you will burn more calories by hitting the bag harder and training more intensely, it’s not worth it if you end up injuring yourself. Make sure you’re punching correctly, are equipped with the right boxing gloves – not MMA gloves as these aren’t sufficiently padded – and warm up well to prevent pulling any muscles.

Also, bear in mind that you shouldn’t train hard every day. It can be fun, relieving and even addictive to train every day, but your body needs rest to rebuild muscle. Include some rest days in your week or do a milder activity like walking or cycling if you want to stay active – just make sure you lower the intensity of your exercise.