Boxing has many tools available to help hone a fighter’s pugilistic skills. There’s the heavy bag, which concentrates on developing strength and power, the speed bag which helps improve hand quickness, coordination, and timing. And then there’s the double end bag.
The double end bag, also known as the floor-to-ceiling bag, is a small, circular bag connected on both ends of the floor and ceiling by an elastic cord. They vary in size and shape, with rebound elasticity able to be adjusted. It offers a myriad of ways to perform different punching skill workouts.
Unique to the sport of boxing, the double-end bag offers a chance to improve rhythm, timing, and accuracy more so than technique. It gives fighters the opportunity to experiment by throwing any kind of punch.
Sure, fighters can always try to emulate real offensive sequences such as starting combinations with the jab, but the double end bag offers a chance to be creative.
Furthermore, the double end bag allows a fighter to improve accuracy. Technique and conditioning no doubt develop power, but timing and accuracy allow fighters to effectively use that power. Conversely, throwing power punches is easy, but connecting power punches on a mobile target is difficult.
Every fighter needs to train on the double end bag, but for some reason, it’s only the pros that really give it focus. Understand why the double end bag is important in your development as a boxer. Today, Evolve Daily shares four ways the double-end bag benefits fighters.
1) It Improves Hand Speed
There’s an age-old saying in boxing that goes “speed kills”, and it couldn’t be truer. Speed leads to accuracy, which also leads to power. If given the chance to choose between developing speed or developing power, speed should win every single time.
The way the double end bag moves across a horizontal plane, swiftly and erratically shifting back and forth and side to side requiring fighters to utilize fast and quick punches at a constant pace in order to connect cleanly and maintain rhythm. Many boxers tend to get used to executing slow combinations on a stationary heavy bag, and once they hit competition they end up being too slow and tend to telegraph their punches. The double end bag corrects this flaw.
More so, the double end bag also develops cardiovascular endurance, while getting your arms accustomed to throwing multiple punches at a rapid pace.
2) It Trains You To Miss Punches
The reality is, not every punch you throw in a fight or in a boxing match is going to land. You’ll probably miss, and you’ll miss often. That’s just the way it is. The double end bag allows you to get used to the feeling of missing punches, thus training you to become smarter with your energy expenditure, and allowing you to develop your accuracy at the same time.
Another common teaching in boxing is that it uses up much more energy when you miss a punch than when you connect. Anyone who has ever competed or sparred before knows this is true. Putting your power and weight behind a punch and then missing and hitting nothing but air can sap your energy very quickly. It will tire your arms out significantly.
The double end bag doesn’t bounce your hand back at you the way focus mitts or heavy bag training does. This means fighters have to use more muscle and energy to retract the arm back on defense, especially when you miss the target.
3) Increase Your Accuracy
The most obvious benefit to be gained from using the double end bag is improved accuracy.
The double end bag, different from other training tools in boxing, is a variably smaller target which moves around frequently and erratically, requiring fighters to use their eyes more to time their punches. It is different from the heavy bag which is fairly stationary with a wide punching area, and therefore easier to hit. The double end bag will raise your accuracy, as well as your hand-eye coordination especially if you are able to connect on it multiple times in succession.
It also helps with your rhythm.
Because the double end bag constantly moves, swaying back and forth and side to side, even at angles, it is very hard to predict its movement. When punching and connecting rapidly, it allows fighters to build up a rhythm, which then trains fighters to be able to adapt to a moving target. Developing this fighting rhythm and embedding it into your muscle memory makes you more effective and energy efficient in competition.
4) Channel Your Power And Reflexes
Lastly, if anything else, the double end bag still develops your power, despite its nature. As stated before, power is important in boxing, but if you can’t hit your target, power is meaningless. Because the double end bag trains and improves your accuracy, it enhances your power as well.
Punching power is different from punching skill. Sound technique and ample conditioning is a prerequisite for making you a stronger puncher. But it is timing and accuracy that actually allows you transfer your own weight and power to the target.
This is the reason why so many professionals and high-level boxers utilize the double end bag. At first, it may not seem like you are doing anything purposeful. But hidden behind its unpredictable movement, the double end bag is secretly honing your intangible punching skills.
In addition to all the above-mentioned benefits, the double end bag also trains your reflexes. It empowers you to make full use of your vision, allowing you to be fully aware of the double end bag, or in real fights, your opponent’s head movement.
Skilled opponents with sound head movement are elusive and are hard to hit, just like the double-end bag. Training the double end bag is important if you want to become a better fighter.
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