Speed and/or Heavy Bag Gloves?

I found out that my gym (the Y) has a little room that has a speed bag and a heavy bag (and jump ropes). A light bulb went on and said this is what I want to do for my cardio, I’ve been thinking about it for a while. I workout (lift) 3-4x’s a week (for a few + years) and am an over 35’er (understating) just staying in better shape. How should I get into this, by myself. I guess the important thing is what kind of gloves should I get, to do both, speed and heavy, for working out not sparring (yet). Thanks for any help.

For the speed bag, you don’t really need gloves, in fact I think they would just get in your way. For the heavy bag, I would recommend a pair of sparring gloves, like 16oz size, and a set of handwraps(I prefer Mexican because they are longer, but standard would work too).

You will want some sort of timer with an audible alarm for your rounds, an egg timer might work if the bell is loud enough. You don’t want to keep looking at a clock or watch to check your time.

As to how to do it, best bet would be to either look on youtube for speed bag videos, or buy one from Ringside.com. Same thing on how to wrap your hands, there is a little of an art to it, so you will definitely want some help in that regard.

I have to stress the wraps and actual padded gloves(not bag gloves), since it would not be too hard to fracture your hand without them. The heavy bag is pretty straight forward, just work jabs, crosses, and hooks, to both head and body, for the rounds you set(2-3 min. is a good starting point, with 1 min in between).

A good bag workout would be similar to this:

(3:00 round/1:00 recovery)
2-3 rounds jumping rope
2-3 rounds speed bag
4-6 rounds heavy bag.

Of course you can play with the number and length of rounds yourself, just like you would with your sets and reps.

Heavy bag work will compress the padding of sparring gloves pretty fast and you are paying for that extra padding. They make training gloves that are a bit cheaper and are designed for the bag.

If you are going to hit a lot I would defineatly get a good pair of leather gloves.
www.titleboxing.com has a big selection at reasonable prices.

Correction, I meant get the heavy, heavy bag glvoes. The training gloves are as expensive and as soft as sparring gloves (which are really one and the same).

I have the Title gel bag gloves and they are 20oz and are really easy on the joints.

gotta agree w/ JRT - nice sparring/fight gloves get expensive quick and a heavy bag will wear them out. Get a pair of gloves specifically for working heavy bags. (titleboxing or ringside.com both have a great selection).

Wrap your hands, you can find instructions on how to that on Ringside.com (go to the bottom of the home page and look for the link).

Skip the gloves and wraps while working on the speed bag. Speed bag is more about timing and endurance. That focus, along with the position your are in to work the bag, you won’t be hitting it hard enough to worry about needing gloves.

If you have never worked a speed bag, some instruction will help - there are a ton of videos out there to help. It is not a normal movement, and will take a little time and rythm, but like riding a bike, one day it will click.

Also, if you haven’t worked a heavy bag much, learning some punching technique will help greatly. It is very easy to destroy the small bones in your hand and damage your wrist and shoulders if you are heavy handed and have poor technique.

Beyond that, add some body movement into it - circle the bag, back away from it, and move in close - if you no desire to actually fight, your footwork technique is not as important - but it will greatly help your workout.

get bag gloves combatsports.com

Don’t hit the heavy bag too hard right away. Let your hands get used too it. Alot of beginners make the mistake of throwing bombs at the heavy bag and then their hands hurt for days.

Hey guys, great responses, just what I was looking for. I checked things at various sites to get an idea or two and you guys summed it up. Once I got past boatguys avatar; I know that I need wraps and what to do when I get there, agree with Jr and Dozer that I don’t need to spend too much on gloves and law400, absolutely agree with not killing it right away. I want to stay injury free. I hate seeing new guys come in and rack up a ton of weight do a half a set and thats the last time you see them in the gym.

For the speed bag, could I wear the wraps or just bare knuckle it? I assume I should be trying this on the non lifting days? I suppose I’ll learn more as I JUST DO IT.

Anyways thanks for the info. I’ll be going to sports authortiy soon looking for something in between sparring loves and bag gloves.

You can bare knuckle the speed bag but your knuckles will get rubbed raw for a while. I wear either wraps or my mma gloves for the double end bag I own.

I like to do the bags for either a warmup before lifting or as an intense finisher afterwards. All my long bag sessions are usually at MT class. There is a lot of debate about how many times a week one can do heavy bag sessions but I personally can only get away with two. Start easy and work your way up to what you find tolerable.

I have to do conditioning and lifting on the same day frequently due to my work schedule and it dosen’t bother me at all.