HIGH-INTENSITY CONDITIONING FOR BOXING

Welcome to this special e-book ‘High-Intensity Conditioning for Boxing’.

This has been built on years of research and thousands of gruelling
sessions, and we’re excited to share this with you over the next 40 or so
pages.

CONTENTS

THE PHYSIOLOGICAL DEMANDS OF BOXING 3

HIGH INTENSITY INTERVAL TRAINING 17
MUSCLE BUFFERING CONDITIONING 27
SPRINT INTERVAL TRAINING 37

THE BATTLE OF THE FITTEST

Physical conditioning has always been a huge priority for boxers.
Whether it’s Muhammad Ali’s long road runs, Mike Tyson’s skipping
workouts or Manny Pacqiaou’s track sessions, the greats have always
put in the hard graft in search for supreme fitness.

In fact, ask any boxer and they’ll tell you how important physical fitness
is for successful performance. It’s important to be able to work at high-
intensities, last the distance and perform to your full boxing potential,
from the first round to the 12th.

Over recent years, the growth in popularity of high-intensity interval

training (HIIT) has challenged traditional methods of long-steady runs to
build endurance. But how can HIIT be beneficial for Boxing
performance?

In this handbook, the Boxing Science co-founders Danny Wilson and Dr

Alan Ruddock break down the science behind boxing and the
physiological demands of boxing that define our need for high-intensity
conditioning. We will then introduce the three pillars to our conditioning
methods, their benefits and applications as well as case studies of where
they’ve helped athletes become fitter than ever!

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 THE PHYSIOLOGICAL DEMANDS OF BOXING
The longest potential duration for a professional boxing match is 47 min
with 36 min that time considered active. At boxing's most extreme, the
world-record for the greatest number of punches thrown in a fight by a
single boxer is 1848 over 10 rounds - that's a strike rate of 1 punch a
second for 30 min.

That might sound extreme but it's not unusual to see strike rates of 150
punches per round in domestic level competition too. For reference, the
average number of punches per round is somewhere in the region of 60
(Compubox) - a strike rate of 1 every 3 seconds.

The pace of the fight is determined, in principle, by tactics. A boxer

might want to start quickly and take the first 3 rounds before settling into
the fight, or they might want to increase the intensity each round. They
might even pace themselves within a round to 'steal' points by
impressing judges in a specific way.

A well-known psychological concept called 'serial positioning' relates to

memory recall. It describes two components of our recall bias - primary
and recency effects - in other words, we remember the things we see
first and last but we don't recall middle events as well. With this in a
mind a boxer might want to start fast and finish fast to have the greatest
impact on judges perception and in some instances 'steal' the round.

Nevertheless, the pace of a fighter is limited firstly by the opponent but

secondly the fitness of the boxer.

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THE RED ZONE
Boxing is a high-intensity intermittent-impact sport that forces athletes
into the red zone (>90% max heart rate) so boxers should look to
develop the ability to perform at high intensities.

You’ll know what the red zone feels like… your breathing is heavy and
your heart is pumping hard and it feels ‘very hard’. It’s easy to make
mistakes in this zone, thinking is harder, footwork slower and maybe
your punch force is a little less.

These are all normal physiological responses; what we need to do is train

the physiological mechanisms that determine the severity of these
responses.

As an athlete, we want you to become red zone dominant. We want you

to be able to work in the red zone with clarity, rapid footwork and
forceful punches.

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FIGHT INTENSITY

Each boxer has a critical intensity; we'll call it fight or performance

intensity.

If a boxer can work at their performance intensity and their tactical

strategy is effective, then they’ll be performing relatively well. We'd
usually say they are dictating the pace or fighting to their rhythm.

But if they are required to exceed this fight intensity either because they
are trying to force their opponent into a tactically disadvantageous
position, or trying to force a stoppage; or their opponent has increased
their fight intensity to disrupt rhythm, then a boxer must have the
opportunity to recover from this time period.

If they can't recover then fatigue will develop, punch volume and
accuracy will decline, mistakes will be made and you know how the rest
of the story goes.

The graph below describes the relationship between very hard exercise
for 60 s and the intensity during a recovery duration of 30 s. What should
be clear from this figure is that even if an athlete is working very hard - if
they are given the opportunity to recover they can prevent fatigue and
prolong exercise duration. This is what happens in the line that extends

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recovery duration past 1000's - the 60 s is intense but the 30 s is light
exercise enabling recovery from the previous interval.

But, if the athlete has to work hard in the recovery period then the
exercise task isn't going to last as long because they can't recover. The
line that extends to around 500 s illustrates that if the 60 s interval is
intense but the recovery is only slightly less intense then the time an
athlete can exercise for is decreased.

The reason athletes fatigue quicker when recovery is limited is because

they can't resynthesise energy stores fast enough before the next bout
of very hard exercise. This exercise period is so intense it creates cellular
acidosis (you might call it the 'burn') and makes the bodies' job of
producing force a lot more difficult. If the recovery bout is also hard then
there's less opportunity to buffer this acidosis.

LESS RECOVERY = MORE ACIDOSIS = FATIGUE.

Take a look at the graph below. The dotted lines represent performance
(or fight) intensity. Notice that fighter A's performance intensity is below
the tip of their red zone but greater than the red zone for fighter B.

In this situation, the intensity of the fight is greater than what fighter B is
capable of. This means
fighter B has to work very
hard to match the
intensity of fighter A and
will likely have to work
equally as hard when all
they want to do is try and
recovery, fatigue will
occur very quickly for
fighter B. In this situation
we'd say fighter A is
dictating the pace and
rhythm and dominating
the contest.

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LIMITATIONS OF INTENSITY

So what limits fight intensity? Notice the size of the rectangles and think
of them as energy tanks. Fighter A's energy tank is greater than fighter
B's. That energy tank reflects fitness or more specifically aerobic
capacity. A fighter with a larger aerobic capacity is able to produce more
aerobic energy and more energy results in greater performance intensity.

The goal of conditioning is to make that tank as large as possible. This

will enable you to set your performance intensity at a greater level than
your opponent which will eventually force fatigue if you get your tactics
right.

Not only that but if you couple it with a large anaerobic capacity and high
force capabilities you'll have the ability to perform at a high intensity, dip
into your high force energy reserves and severely disrupt your opponent,
drop back to your fight intensity to recover, repeat and dominate.

What we've seen at boxing science is that our boxers who are at the elite
level have the best conditioning from both an aerobic and anaerobic
point. They perform above and beyond others in our high-speed
treadmill tests and they transfer this ability to their performances in the
ring. In other words, they can reach higher speeds before they fatigue.

This is also well documented in the scientific literature on high standard

boxers who have aerobic capacities similar to those of regional and
national standard endurance athletes.

LEARN MORE ABOUT THE SCIENCE BEHIND BOXING

In this workshop, Dr Alan Ruddock takes

you through the scientific research of
boxing. This is available in the Boxing
Science Membership, sign up today for
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THE SCIENCE

The graph below represents the type of energy used during simulated
amateur boxing competition.

The main points from this figure are:

1) Boxers perform at a high intensity around 85-90% of their

maximum aerobic capacity.
2) 77% of energy is derived from aerobic pathways
3) 19% from immediate pathways
4) 4% from intermediate energy pathways

And it further illustrates that performance intensity is dictated by

aerobic capacity. For example, if aerobic capacity is 4.5 L/min for
fighter A then they'd be able to perform at 4 L/min (90%) and produce
energy at a rate of 20 Kcal per minute. Fighter B with an aerobic
capacity of 3.5 L/min would be able to perform at 16 Kcal per minute.
Over a 12 round contest, this relates to a total energy expenditure of
720 Kcal vs 576 Kcal and a deficit of 144 Kcal which in energy terms
gives around 2.3 extra rounds to Fighter A.

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WHAT DETERMINES THE SIZE OF THE TANK?
The Fick equation describes the principle physiological determinants of
aerobic capacity.

VO2 = Q x a-vO2diff
VO2 = Oxygen uptake Q = Cardiac output a-vO2diff = arteriovenous
oxygen difference

In other words
Q = how much oxygen rich blood you can deliver to your muscles and
brain (and to an extent get blood back to your heart).

a-vO2diff = how well you can extract oxygen from your blood and utilise it
within your muscle cells to produce energy.

TO IMPROVE AEROBIC CAPACITY WE NEED TO:

1) Improve the way in which our heart pumps and relaxes to eject
blood

2) Improve the vascular network of arteries, capillaries and veins to

help the transport of this blood

3) Improve the function of oxidative enzymes within the muscle cell

We can do this very effectively with high-intensity conditioning.

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HOW WE DETERMINE INTENSITY
This is a major part of the Boxing Science programme - we usually start
by defining intensity using a rating of perceived exertion scale.
The image on the next page is the cleverly named Foster's modified
category ratio 10 scale. It's numbered from 0 to 10 and each of these
points has a descriptor of intensity - or rating of perceived exertion. For
example 1 is very easy whilst 10 represents maximum effort. This is a
very useful scale for us because it allows us develop zones that help us
describe, prescribe and revise our training.

Zone 1 is the recovery zone - An RPE of anything from 1 (very easy) to

3 (moderate - or just below). It normally equates around 75% HRmax.
You want to be spending some time in this zone but like many athletes
you don't have the time to commit to spending hours in this zone to get
the fitness gains from it and its not specific to the demands of boxing
either.

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To improve fitness, tradition dictates that boxers perform steady-state
cardio for around 30 to 40 min; unfortunately they do so in what we call
no-man's land. This is an RPE between 4 (somewhat hard) and 7 (very
hard), it's the kind of intensity that feels like it's hard but not too hard,
like you're getting a sweat on but it's not uncomfortable. Some research
has shown that this zone is actually the most enjoyable for a lot of
people. Getting punched, however, is not enjoyable and training in this
zone isn't going to help that.
The zone where the magic happens is zone 3. Specifically RPE's of 9
and 10 - very hard and maximum or what we call - The Red Zone. This
is because of two main factors;

1) When your competing and sparring you'll be forced into these zones
(remember the research above)

2) Training at these RPE's provides the muscles and the circulatory

system with clear and strong signals to improve.

Our training system will help you to dominate the red zone physically
and psychologically.

You might have seen various definitions of interval training around but
we like to use these:

Sprint interval training = maximum intensity efforts from 5 to 30 s.

RPE = 10/10

Speed endurance training = 30 s to 2 min RPE = 9/10

Short high-intensity interval training 2 to 5 min RPE = 9/10

Long high-intensity interval training 5 to 15 min RPE = 9/10

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IN BRIEF: PHYSIOLOGICAL DEMANDS OF BOXING

• Boxing isn't an endurance sport! It's a sport of repeated high-

intensities.
• Studies suggest that boxing is predominantly an aerobic sport
(75 - 80%), therefore increasing an athletes aerobic capacity is a
priority.
• The majority of time during sparring and competitive bouts is
spent above 90% maximum heart rate, often referred to as 'The
Red Zone'.
• An athletes capability to perform repeated high-intensity activities
is often a determining factor of performance.

With these important facts in place - we need to define our

conditioning strategy.

BLOOD LACTATE PROFILE

11 202 210
198
Blood Lactate (mmol/L)

191 196
9 192 190
183
186
Heart rate (bpm)
171 178 7.77
7 162 6.88 170
165
6.13
152 157 4.89 5.36
5 150
146
4.24
3.97

3 2.32 3 130
2.68
2.38
1.93 1.76 1.97

1 110
11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20

Running Speed (kph)

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This simple test provides us with a lot of useful information. The test
consists of 3 min running with a 1 min rest period. In that rest, we take a
small fingertip blood sample and analyse it for lactate. Lactate is closely
related to acidosis and fatigue so that when lactate in the blood rises we
can be confident the athlete is working harder to maintain speed. We
increase the speed after each 3-minute stage until the athlete is working
very hard.

On the figure, you'll notice speed on the horizontal axis and blood lactate
on the left and heart rate on the right vertical axes. The lower dots
represent a blood lactate value taken after 3 min at each speed, the
higher dots are heart rate taken at the end of each 3 min stage. The most
distinctive feature of the figure is the curve of the line after 15 kph. It
rises very quickly because lactate has started to appear in greater
concentrations within the athlete's blood, telling us that the intensity of
exercise is getting more difficult for our athlete.

BOXER VS ENDURANCE ATHLETE

Sometimes boxers have a blood lactate profile that looks very similar to
an endurance athlete. Both are very good at running and controlling the
intensity early on in the test. But, as we crank up the speed boxers, like
endurance athletes find it increasingly difficult to deal with the
accompanying cellular acidosis.

This is bad news for an athlete who needs to repeatedly produce high
force and control acidosis. The first problem is that the absolute intensity
or force probably won't be as great as it could be, the 2nd problem is
that even if they did go deep into the red zone they'd find it very hard to
recover quickly enough from it, and thirdly without the capability to
produce high-force and recover from it, there's limited potential to able
to repeat high-force actions which is a crucial aspect of combat sports
performance.

We train our athletes to make sure they don’t look like endurance
athletes so that they can produce, recover and repeat high-intensity
actions without losing control.

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OUR CONDITIONING GOAL

Improve the ability to produce, repeat and endure high-intensity

activities.

We develop this by cycling through a range of conditioning methods

targeting different physiological adaptations.

After 1000's of sessions, we have over 100 different conditioning

sessions in our locker that sit across our conditioning continuum.

It would take a full book to explain every single run, maybe one day we'll
have the luxury of producing one but for now, let’s cover the three main
conditioning sessions in detail.

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 HIGH-INTENSITY INTERVAL TRAINING
Aerobic capacity sets the upper limit of boxing performance. The more
oxygen you can deliver to your muscles to fuel energy production the
better you'll be able to perform repeated high-intensity actions.

The amount of oxygen you can deliver to your muscles is limited by your
heart. If you can improve the amount of blood that is pumped out of your
heart and the network of arteries and veins you'll be able to fuel high-
intensity performance.

So the target in our 4 min interval sessions is to spend an optimal amount

of time in the red zone, close to maximum pumping capacity of the heart
and oxidative capacity of the muscles. By carefully implementing this
training strategy over a training camp the aim is to create a bigger engine
to power performance and recover between rounds.

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4 MINUTES ON : 2 MINUTES OFF
Central cardiovascular adaptations, improvements in cardiac output and
delivery of oxygen to exercising muscle is improved by high-intensity
interval training lasting between 4 and 10 minutes at an intensity
equivalent to 90% of maximum oxygen uptake repeated 4 to 6 times.
These findings have been replicated in scientific studies consistently
over the past 20 years and we've also found this type of training to be
very effective.

However, although integral to improvements in aerobic capacity and

performance, beneficial structural adaptations to the heart and the rest
of the circulatory system take around 6 to 10 weeks, much longer than
sprint interval training (SIT) and therefore require a prolonged training
focus.

WHY IS THIS BENEFICIAL FOR BOXING?

These types of session are important in a boxer’s perception of intensity

because they challenge the athlete to exercise in the red zone - a
physiological state close to maximum effort, thus preparing a boxer for
performance, physically and mentally. We’ve already seen that boxers
are forced into the red zone during sparring and competition and these
type of training sessions mimic these demands.

WHAT DOES HIGH-INTENSITY INTERVAL TRAINING INVOLVE?

In these sessions you’ll be required to run for at least 4 min at an RPE of

9/10. At a minimum, you’ll have 4 sets of 4 minutes of work to complete.
Your job is run at the highest possible sustainable speed for each of the
4 sets.

Effectively you’ve been given the equation and your job is to work out
the speed.

𝑆𝑝𝑒𝑒𝑑 𝑠𝑒𝑡 1 + 𝑆𝑝𝑒𝑒𝑑 𝑠𝑒𝑡 2 + 𝑆𝑝𝑒𝑒𝑑 𝑠𝑒𝑡 3 + 𝑆𝑝𝑒𝑒𝑑 𝑠𝑒𝑡 4

= 𝑀𝑒𝑎𝑛 𝐴𝑣𝑒𝑟𝑎𝑔𝑒 𝑆𝑝𝑒𝑒𝑑 (𝑜𝑣𝑒𝑟𝑎𝑙𝑙 𝑖𝑛𝑡𝑒𝑛𝑠𝑖𝑡𝑦)
4

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The first goal of each interval is to get into the red zone as quickly as
possible, ideally within 60 to 90 s, that way you’ll be able to optimise
your training session. The major goal of these sessions is to spend the
majority of the working time (example 4 minutes) in the red zone (90-
100% Max Heart Rate). For example, lets say it takes 90 s for you to get
into the red zone, that means you’ll spend 2.5 min of each 4 minute
interval in the red zone. Multiply this by 4 and that’s 10 min in the red
zone and a very effective stimulus for improving aerobic capacity.

HOW CAN I PERFORM THE RED ZONE RUNS?

The best way to control the intensity of your HIIT session is to use a
motorised treadmill. This is because you can set the gradient and speed
and you won't be interrupted within an interval. It also means you can
closely track your progress because if your speed is increasing then you
know you're adapting to the training - make sure you use the recording
sheet to help you do this.

You can also perform HIIT outside, whether that’s on a track or on the
road. A running track is better than the road because you don't have the
risk of traffic interrupting your interval and you can easily track your
distance within each interval without too much fuss. On the road it’s a
little harder because of the increased traffic, undulations in terrain and
it's not easy to record speed/distance unless you're using a GPS device
or an app.

If you're running on the road it’s usually best to stick with your usual
route so you can control as many things as possible. If you can't run for
any reason another suitable alternative is to perform HIIT on an indoor
bike. Ideally you'd record average power during each interval but some
bikes don't have power meters so the next best thing is speed or the
'level' of intensity. Try to choose the same bike each time for your
intervals (same for treadmills too) as gym-based treadmills can deviate
between each other despite being the same model.

Another alternative is an indoor rower - usually, we wouldn't recommend

these for SIT but because the technical and force demands of rowing are

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less in HIIT they do enable you to reach the red zone. Like the bike
record the average power for each of your sets.
For all these intervals you'll need to pay close attention to your heart
rate, if you're not in the red zone then you'll need to increase your
exertion to modify the speed or power!

WHY CAN'T I HIT THE RED ZONE?

Before you start your HIIT you need to get a true or estimated value for
your maximum heart rate. There are several predictions - all with flaws,
the easiest way to estimate it is to use 220 - age.

For example;

Age = 25
𝐴𝑔𝑒 𝑝𝑟𝑒𝑑𝑖𝑐𝑡𝑒𝑑 𝑚𝑎𝑥𝑖𝑚𝑢𝑚 ℎ𝑒𝑎𝑟𝑡 𝑟𝑎𝑡𝑒 𝑏𝑝𝑚 = 200 − 25
= 195
90% 𝑚𝑎𝑥𝑖𝑚𝑢𝑚 ℎ𝑒𝑎𝑟𝑡 𝑟𝑎𝑡𝑒 𝑏𝑝𝑚 = 195×0.90
= 176

Your red zone target is therefore 176 bpm.

Another way to calculate your maximum heart rate is to undertake a

ramp assessment. Put the treadmill gradient at 1%, set the speed to 10
kph. Every minute increase the treadmill speed by 1 kph until you can do
no more. This should take you up to your maximum heart rate. If you
don't have access to a treadmill you can do a 6 min time-trial to see how
much distance you can cover - that should also ramp up your heart rate
to near maximum.

Another way to estimate 90% HRmax is to perform an 8 min effort at an

RPE of 9/10. It should just about tip into 90% towards the end of this
interval and you'll have a basis for that 90% value. If you want to
calculate your max HR from this you'll have to divide this value by 0.9.

ℎ𝑒𝑎𝑟𝑡 𝑟𝑎𝑡𝑒 𝑎𝑡 𝑒𝑛𝑑 𝑜𝑓 𝑖𝑛𝑡𝑒𝑟𝑣𝑎𝑙

𝑀𝑎𝑥 ℎ𝑒𝑎𝑟𝑡 𝑟𝑎𝑡𝑒 𝑏𝑝𝑚 =
0.9

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 176
𝑀𝑎𝑥 ℎ𝑒𝑎𝑟𝑡 𝑟𝑎𝑡𝑒 𝑏𝑝𝑚 = = 195
0.9

Most problems arise from not knowing maximum heart rate, the methods
above will help you calculate that.

If you know your red zone heart rate value but still struggle to get there
it's probably because of 3 things.

1) Your warm-up isn't sufficient enough to raise body temperature

2) Your first interval is probably too fast
3) Both of the above

RED ZONE SOLUTIONS

Extend Your Warm-Up

Start slowly for the first 3 min and over the next 2 raise your speed
slightly. Think about working through the RPE gears one minute at a
time. When you get to 5 min you should feel like that speed is hard. After
5 min take 1 min rest, increase the speed again so that you're working
very hard (top of no mans land) for 2 min.

That will take you to 8 min.

Then set the treadmill to your target starting speed and run 3 x 30 s
intervals with 15 s recovery between. Rest for the remainder of the 10
min warm up before starting your session.

Build Up the Intensity

If your interval is too fast to start with you'll be using a significantly

greater anaerobic contribution to the energy demands than you need.
You'll incur an oxygen debt and there will be an increase in cellular
acidosis that you won't be able to buffer.

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This will cause you to run slower than you should after a couple of
minutes and a lower speed = less oyxgen demand and less oxygen
demand = less demand on the cardiovascular system, including heart
rate. This will prevent you from reaching the red zone.

MANIPULATING HIIT VARIABLES

The primary goal of interval training is to improve maximum aerobic

capacity, as such the focus of many interval training programmes has
been to optimise the time close to VO2max. More specifically, the
primary physiological goal of high-intensity interval training is to improve
cardiac output by optimising time at or close to maximum stroke
volume.

However, assessing VO2 and stroke volume is not an option for many
athletes and coaches and % of maximum heart rate or heart rate reserve
are often used as a proxy for cardiac strain and oxygen demand.
Nevertheless, key adaptations resulting from high-intensity interval
training include, improved cardiovascular stability and pumping ability
that leads to improvements in cardiac output, oxygen delivery and
performance.
Below are some examples of how we can manipulate exercise and rest
time to increase time in the red zone and increase running speed.

45 secs on – 15 secs off

This is great for the red zone, however the reps are too long and
recovery too short to maintain a higher speed therefore the intensity isn’t
sufficient.

10 secs on – 10 secs off

This is a good way to increase intensity, however, sometimes we find the

duration too short to elicit sufficient time in red zone.

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30 secs on - 30 secs off

Perfect! Known as the Billat method (after the French physiologist) in its
own right. Performing this within a 4 to 6-minute working set is ideal to
increase intensity and time in the red zone.

When we use intervals such as 30:30's, athletes are able to extend the
time they spend in the red zone before fatiguing. If we asked you to run
hard at a single speed for 10 min there's a good chance you'd fatigue
before then and it's also likely you wouldn't be able to continue training
after this as you'd be forced to near your maximum.When you have a
short rest interval (2 min) between sets of 30:30's it means you can hit
the red zone at higher speeds and get have a well-targeted and effective
session.

LEARN MORE ABOUT CENTRAL ADAPTATIONS

In this workshop, Dr Alan Ruddock takes you through the science behind
these effective sessions, and Danny Wilson shows you how it apply the
sessions and monitor performance in a practical setting. This is available
in the Boxing Science Membership, sign up today for just £8.99
p/month

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 CASE STUDY – KID GALAHAD
Kid Galahad is one of the most dedicated and fittest
boxers in the game and is at the point in his career
where he is challenging for world titles.

Because of this we take a slightly different approach to his conditioning

by manipulating intensity at strategic points in a set and in a session.
Look at the figure below, it describes a typical pacing strategy to a
typical challenge. That challenge can be anything, from homework, to
housework to a time trial.

As a general phenomenon we tend to start relatively fast, but hold

something back, then we then settle into a rhythm but halfway through
the challenge for several reasons we hold even more effort back.

In sport this occurs because we’re not often sure if we have the energy
to complete the task, it’s a protective mechanism to make sure, first and
foremost, we can complete the task. As we progress through the task we
realise we actually do have enough energy towards the end and we
won’t run out of energy so we ramp up the intensity. You’ll notice that
when you get towards the end of a training session and you want to
finish well.

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We try to anticipate the amount of energy we need to complete a
challenge, whether that’s a 30 s or a 4 min interval, whether it’s a 3
rounder or a 12 rounder. The common strategy we use is very similar to
that below. By knowing this we can use it our advantage.

We know that we have enough energy to complete the challenge

because we can pick up the intensity towards the end. What we need to
do is distribute that energy in a way that forces an opponent to doubt
they have enough energy to complete the task, which will cause them to
reduce their intensity and play on their mind. By increasing the intensity
in the middle phase of the task we can train a pacing strategy that has
the potential not only to improve the performance of our athlete but one
that also puts opponents on the back foot.

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As a further example, when motivation is high we push on
physiologically, but when our physiological drive exceeds our critical
intensity threshold, motivation decreases to self-preserve our body in a
protective manner. If we’re able to undulate intensity, work above our
opponents critical intensity, recover and repeat then that is a potentially
effective way to train to improve fitness and disrupt an opponents
strategy and mindset.

We’ve been training Kid Galahad in this way for his bouts against Toka
Clary Kahn and Josh Warrington.

KEY SESSION – SHARP SHOOTER

In his most recent camp for his IBF Featherweight world title fight against
Warrington the game plan was to disrupt Warrington’s pacing strategy
which we identified from video-based performance analysis.

We combined our principle of muscle buffering training (introduced next

page) with an undulating pacing strategy enabling him to work in bursts
at key points, as well as work through the gears and limit the effect of
acidosis on neuromuscular function. An example of the speed of one of
his sessions can be seen in the figure below.

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 MUSCLE BUFFERING

When you perform high-intensity actions you also create an acidic cellular
environment that you might know as the burn. This increase in acidity
makes it hard to generate high forces because our neuromuscular system
doesn't work as well under these conditions.

Our body has a defensive mechanism against this called muscle buffering.
Their job of these buffers is to 'mop' up the cellular by-products of high-
intensity performance and help maintain the pH of the muscle cell.

Our 2 min interval training sessions place the muscle under high-moderate
acidosis which stimulates the activation and production of muscle buffers
and improves the ability to produce high-forces for longer without
completely gassing out because of fatigue.

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Question: What happens when you try and sprint with maximum effort
for longer than 15 s?

Answer: Speed declines rapidly.

Take a look at the figure below. This data is taken from 5 of our boxers
who performed a 30 s maximum sprint effort on our curve treadmill.
We’ve split the 30 s into 2 parts. The first 15 s and the last 15 s. Each dot
represents instantaneous speed at different time intervals. The dotted
lines depict the rate of speed decline.

This Graph Suggests…

1. Peak speed occurs
somewhere around 7
s.
2. The average decline
in speed over the first
15 s is 1.3 kph
(ignoring the peak
speed value).
3. The average decline
Figure 1: Speed response to 30 s maximum effort sprinting in speed over the last
15 s is 4.7 kph.
That’s 72% greater
Our data above is in accordance with energy system contributions to
maximal effort sprinting. You can see below (figure 2) that peak energy
contribution occurs around 7 s, when ATP-PCr energy system rapidly
kicks in shortly followed by glycolysis; after that there’s a rapid decline.

This happens firstly because the ATP-PCr ‘energy pool’ becomes

depleted and glycolysis begins to switch off, probably due to a rapidly
increasing concentration of hydrogen ions - this ‘switch off’ happens to
prevent excessive cellular acidosis (caused by hydrogen ions) and help
protect the cellular environment from major damage.

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What we see and feel after 15 s is a declining speed and strong feelings
of pain, also known as THE BURN!

Energy system contributions to 90 s maximal effort sprinting

Similar responses have also been reported during repeated sprints.

Estimates of energy contribution to repeated-sprint exercise can be seen
below.

Much like the research above, PCr plays a large role in energy
contribution to initial high-intensity actions (46%), as does glycolysis
(40%). But as the number of sprints increases peak power/speed
declines even in short sprints and glycolysis contribution decreases by
around 30%.

Whereas aerobic energy contribution increases and can do so by around

30% too.

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Energy system contribution to repeated sprinting. Note the reversal of energy contribution from glycolysis.

THIS SUGGESTS…

• In early sprints when we’re fresh we use the correct energy systems for
the job
• But as we perform more sprints we stop using the correct energy system
• It means our ability to produce energy to generate high speed and power
is a lot less
• We see this as a lower speed/power in our efforts and increases in
feelings of fatigue

WATCH: MUSCLE BUFFERING SESSION

FOR BOXING

S&C Coach Danny Wilson Takes Anthony

Fowler and Jordan Gill Through A Grueling
Muscle Buffering Session

CLICK HERE TO WATCH THE SESSION

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HOW DOES THIS RELATE TO BOXING?

The figure depicts data 80% 74% 76%

72%
extracted from a piece of

Percentage Energy Contribution

70%
research that simulated 3 x 2 60%
min of amateur boxing, 50%
although the boxers were 40% Aerobic

fairly fit in terms of their 30% 22% 22% 22% PCr

aerobic capacity they were 20% Glycolysis

10% 6% 4% 3%
also novice boxers. We can
0%
see from the figure that 1 2 3
glycolytic energy provision to Round Number
boxing performance is a lot
less than other energy Estimated energy provision during simulated amateur boxing (3 x 2
systems. min rounds)

This could be due to a number of reasons but mainly 1) The glycolytic

potential of the boxers might be low; or 2) the participants in this research
adopted a fast pacing strategy.
From the data it's hard to comment on point 1 but we know from the research
that on average the boxers performed an attacking, defensive or technical
movement every 1.2 s which by the end of the bout induced an average blood
lactate concentration of 9.5 mmol·L-1 which indicates a significant level of
activity and accompanying cellular acidosis. If you recall from the sections
above, glycolysis is sensitive to acidosis and with those kinds of blood lactate
concentrations we could make the assumption that even though glycolytic
contribution is low it is still impaired by acidosis.
This leads us on to another point - doesn't this research show a low level of
glycolytic energy contribution? If so why do we want to train it? Well, certainly
by not training this energy system you’d be missing out on developing a big
slice of that energy pie chart above.

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SO WHAT? WHY IS THIS IMPORTANT TO YOU?

This data gives us an insight into energy provision during boxing even if
it's only from novice amateurs.

What about the professionals?

Well we have no data, but in the last 20
seconds of the 10th round in one of the
slugfests of the 21st century, Keith
Thurman and Shawn Porter detonated
bombs, however, after 10 hard-fought
rounds neither were able to land cleanly
and get the stoppage.

The point? You never know when you’ll find yourself in that kind of battle
or have the opportunity to work harder than you ever thought for 20 s to
get the win.

The solution: Give yourself every opportunity to capitalise on each

opportunity that’s presented to you. It's one of the reasons why we focus
on adaptations and not specific exercise and in part why our
conditioning doesn't always look like, or replicate, the specific demands
of boxing.

For Thurman and Porter, it’s more than likely that after 10 rounds of
intense boxing their glycolytic capability was significantly reduced
because of large ionic disturbances - limiting the potential energy they
could draw on to be effective and limiting their force generating
capability.

You never know, another 4 or 5 more effective punches for either boxer
in that position could have swung the fight their way.

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MUSCLE BUFFERS

So now we know that 20 s very intense efforts are powered heavily by

glycolysis but glycolysis switches off due to acidosis - what can we do
about it?

The major cause of acidosis within

our muscle cell resulting from high-
intensity activity is depicted as H+
(hydrogen ion).

The green circles represent what

we call ‘muscle buffers’. They are
responsible for mopping up H+ and
maintaining the pH of the muscle
cell. When H+ appears in the + -
3
-
Figure 2: Muscle buffer systems. La = lactate; HCO = bicarbonate; H CO
2 3 =

muscle cell the activity of these carbonic acid; Na = sodium; Cl = chloride.

muscle buffers increases. When we stress these systems over a period
of time the number and the function of these muscle buffers increases.

This leads to improvements in the ability of the muscle cell to deal with
acidosis induced by high-intensity activity.

This type of training improves neuromuscular function, transports lactate

out of the cell better, regulates H+ more effectively, enables us to tolerate
muscular pain better and improves energy provision through glycolysis.

This is important because it will enable you to:

1. Perform at much greater intensities, or;

2. Perform at a sub-maximal intensity without feeling the
psychological or physiological strain
3. Recover faster between periods of high-intensity activity
4. Perform more frequent high-intensity actions with less fatigue
5. Dominate your opponent by varying your pace

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HOW DO WE TRAIN THIS?
In our labs we can measure something called
‘blood lactate’, it’s very closely linked to
hydrogen ions that make our cell acidic and so
it’s a good marker of acidosis. A few pieces of
scientific research have identified optimal
lactate ‘zones’, so that’s what we aim for.
We’ve also found that we can use RPE to
predict blood lactate for our target range so you don’t always need to
assess blood lactate. It’s very specific to the type of session of session
you’ll be performing but in your training programme we’ll give you
guidance.
If you’ve followed our programmes before then you’ll know how we like
to use max effort sprints and red zone runs in our conditioning. These
sessions are easy to regulate because you all you have to do is put in
maximum effort (which you’ll know whether or not you’re doing) and use
your heart rate monitor or RPE to know if you’re in the red zone.

The muscle buffer sessions are ‘creepers’, in the first few reps you can’t
always feel the intensity - usually because your body (as we looked at
above) can deal with the metabolites that occur with hard exercise early
in the session. But as the session continues you end up going one of two
ways:

1. Fatigue can creep up on you quickly and destroy the rest of your
session by slowing you down;
2. You can feel good and push on past your target zone and burn
through the session in which case you’ll fry yourself and delayed
perceptions of fatigue will hit you later that day or in the training
week which can increase the risk of overtraining.
The idea is to find the right balance because if you hit these sessions too
hard they can fry you. In the above examples during 1) you’ve gone off
too fast and in 2) you’ve pushed past the target zone and gone too hard.
There really is a sweet spot during these sessions. It’s up to you to find
this, RPE is typically 8 to 8.5

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CASE STUDY – ANTHONY FOWLER
Here are some great results from Anthony Fowler following a training
camp in 2018 that consisted of a muscle buffering phase.

The infographic below shows how Anthony improved his performance on

the lactate profile.

Anthony followed the protocols mentioned in the previous section,

however we had to use some tricks in order to get into the target lactate
zone

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 SPRINT INTERVAL TRAINING

Delivering more oxygen to the muscle to help improve performance using

4 min intervals is effective but the adaptions take weeks because of the
physiological structures that need to remodel. However, sometimes we
need a rapid change in fitness to kick-start our training and this what 30 s
max effort sprints give us.

When oxygen is extracted from the blood to the muscle cell it needs to be
utilised by oxidative enzymes. The more oxidative enzymes we have and
the better they function provides us with a better chance to produce
energy for high-intensity performance.

30 s max effort sprints provide a strong signal for rapid changes in

oxidative enzyme capacity and function as well as having beneficial effects
on neuromuscular force generation, coordination at high speed and
mental toughness. If you need a serious kick at the start of camp these
sessions provide you with a kick like no other.

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WWW.BOXINGSCIENCE.CO.UK 38
 rapid changes in fitness have been reported in
scientific studies after short periods of sprint interval training, typically 3
weeks or 9 sessions. So we can get huge fitness gains during short
training camps.

LEARN MORE ABOUT MAX EFFORT SPRINTS

In this workshop, Dr Alan Ruddock takes you through the science behind
these effective sessions, and Danny Wilson shows you how it apply the
sessions and monitor performance in a practical setting. This is available
in the Boxing Science Membership, sign up today for just £8.99
p/month

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30s Max Out Total Rest 3 mins Repeat 4-6 Dead Zone!!
Effort reps

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WWW.BOXINGSCIENCE.CO.UK 41
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This membership gives you to
ALL of our Train Like A
Champion Programmes, as
well as all the video content
included in the Boxing
Science Membership.
This includes 10-week
strength, running, movement
and nutrition programmes,
and will support you on your
journey to world level fitness.

SIGN UP
£19.99/MONTH

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 LEARN MORE WITH BOXING SCIENCE
Boxing Science have produced 100s of hours of FREE content
available, to help you improve boxing performance TODAY.

Training tips, exercise tutorials, boxing updates, previews,

training highlights and in depth articles are all available, for
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