Surprising Boxing Health Benefits - Term Paper Example

Public Speaking Insert name Insert Institution Introduction Boxing is among the many physical engagement sports that is widely known and watched. It is associated with many benefits on people who practice it. The benefits include; improved muscle structure and mental strength. It actually balances the soul, mind and body in whole. Boxing shows individuals; how to protect themselves during dangerous situation, the simple way of loosing excess weight that is up to 500 calories for a single work out, how to keep a healthy heart through enhancing its functional responsibilities and the same happens to the body in general. Individuals who engage in boxing develop attributes like self-confidence and discipline, as it is neither easy nor normal for one wake up regularly to run, go to the gym in the evening and to check wait through diet. Boxing on health Boxing affect health directly and its results can be accounted for properly. The effects include; increase in body power, improved health, increased sensitivity and reflexes. 1. Increase body power Boxing involves offensive and defensive moves that keep the body at serious work. The work involves offensive and defensive moves. Therefore, to attain an offense, maximum power is applied (Goodwin, 2003). This maximum power is achieved with consistence by the boxer who has his/her muscle stretching and fist punching. There is need for the body muscles to continue work efficiently for a longer period of time while experiencing high tension and at the same time the other body muscles function straight. Human beings are susceptible to fatigue and what matters is how long you can endure it. During boxing there is high muscle and mental concentration resulting in fatigue on the respiratory, nervous and circulatory systems. This should not be a problem because regular boxing practices improves your endurance as the muscle get used to working under high tension for long hours eventually improving the various body system functions. When one is in a boxing ring, he/she is focused on gaining advantage over the opponent through power and skills. Possessing high power enables boxers to instill psychological fear and loss of confidence on the opponent. For an individual to attain victory during a match there has to be a combination of power and speed. The boxer has to be fast so that the power involved can be effective and produce results. 2. Increased sensitivity and reflexes Boxing requires a very high level of sensitivity and rapid reflexes as one of its basic qualities. This is very vital during a competition because the boxer possess a lot of technical tactic that need to be combined. The combination should be fast and accurate for the boxer to be effective. This is why the boxer has to be very sensitive and have rapid accurate reflexes such that there is no room for susceptibility to the offensive moves made by the opponent. This keeps the boxer on point as any error on reflex can be very disastrous and even cause a match loss. Practicing boxing equips an individual with fast response abilities that are also help in the daily life. You will experience an ease of living and engage your life with fun and excitement. 3. Improved mental health During boxing, the human brain is engaged as much as it is during other activities but there is a slight difference. The difference comes in as it involves a little bit of complication when actual work is going on. All the action of the boxer in the ring is very complex because there is increased demand for an effective combination of body motion and fast brain response analysis appropriately. The demand also applies the same for the other body organs and the brain. These entities always have to work together for a complete body system (respiratory, circulatory, nervous and motion) and so the working condition should be stable for proper working, any changes affect their work simultaneously. Scientific and biological research show that boxing; increases oxygen intake up to 3000ml/minute, improve pulse rate to 200 times/minute or even more, increased heart blood volume and also development of strong heart beats.Boxing puts human capabilities and psychology into test. People learn to concentrate and pursue the cause of maintaining spirit. The brain will be trained to accommodate emergence responses and be able to work under high tension while maintaining psychological calmness. This applies directly in our daily life experiences the expected and non- expected. Boxing is for sure a healthy sport as it can be practiced up to the old age. For instance, the boxing legends like Mohammed Ali, Shi Hai, Mike Tyson, Evader Holy-field etc. practiced boxing up to the age of almost 40 and over unlike other active sporting activities. This clearly shows that boxing has positive health effects on the human body (Farrow, Young &Bruce 2002). Self defense skills from boxing The technique of boxing can be applied in real life for self-defense. Boxing has defensive and offensive techniques and they are quite easy to learn and master them fully. The techniques are learnt well because of repeated exercise, this equips an individual with all the necessary techniques for quality self defense. Boxing blows and practice improves awareness and polish skills for a person to use in self-protection. Boxing enables an individual the importance of personal stance and movement. They are the most essential foundations in boxing and any other sport. The experience of a person can be determined by movement and how they stand, Boxing teaches people how to maintain balance, which is crucial to avoid imbalances during defense or fight. During self-defense events happen in split seconds and balance has proved vital for the entire process, as lack of balance at any point will make you vulnerable to the opponent. Boxing trains individuals on where to put their hands to avoid obscuring vision and be able to block a punch or a kick (Jerry, 2008). Training in a boxing class determines how an individual will react to an emergency when it comes to self-protection. Swift moves are the most appropriate as there is no time to think on the next move and countering a move is essential to block the opponent from causing harm to the person. Boxing classes is crucial is enhancing individuals fitness. Cardiovascular health will improve and muscular contraction will not be stiff. This is a good work out for people with excess fat deposits as legs are in constant motion, back, biceps and shoulders are worked out non-stop. Sparring skills ought to sharpen if an individual is to protect him/herself well. In classes punching bags are used and upon hitting it, it does not hit back but in real situation hit backs are there. This makes blocking and self-defense techniques crucial in the process. The skills are imparted to people and the muscles have memory of the same, this will be easy in case of a strike. Transitioning from boxing to self-defense is not a major problem, as many events in real life do not require rules as the game of boxing. In self-protection an individual cares only about him/herself and not anything else. In conclusion, boxing plays a crucial part in self-defense, as flexibility will be at a higher level and the techniques learnt in class are put into action. Boxing also has other benefits in toning body muscles and increasing blood flow therefore improving cardiovascular system. Boxing Training This training focuses on developing and improving performance, structure of muscles, and skill pattern of the neuro-muscles through the development of energy sources appropriately. Training programs should comply with the basic principles and processes of training such that they can prevent injury to the athlete and at the same time maintain the health of the athlete. The ‘principles of training journal’ is very comprehensive in the tactics and best methods of training. Its second section which talks about; restoration, overtraining and recovery gives an inner depth of training athletes for competition purposes and what they need to know. Agility training for experienced athletes by Patrick and Holmberg gives insights into progressive training, movement coupling information and training schedules for different athletes of different levels. These sources provide a good basis for the study under investigated by this paper and its practical application in the field. As much as long-term athlete development provides information for nurturing young talent, it does not provide much information on the training of already participating athletes in the field ( Chelladurai, Yuhasz & Sipura, 1977). Agility training applied on different levels of athletes helped to come up with the best group suited to adopt the agility training. Pattern and technical training methods were applicable in determining levels of skill development and refinement Training can also be based on the aerobic and the anaerobic balanced combination. Aerobic means that one performs within their oxygen capacity while anaerobic is when one uses oxygen that is limited every time. Usually the body is limited to the anaerobic performance outcome, this is due to the fact that the body will get alternative source of oxygen to provide to the body during such conditions, these sources are usually limited. During this period, the body goes through what is called ‘Oxygen debt’ and more lactic acid is built up in the body which leads to neuro-mascular breakdown (Besier et al. 2001). Research has concluded that for one to reach elite stage in athletics, it would require eight to ten years of training and called the ten- year rule. However, presently it has been found out that most coaches and parents believe in the last minute preparations i.e. short term-approach is emphasized on. Long-term preparation and commitment are however the best way to produce better results. Performances that are successful receive recognition and are reacted to appropriately in the situations where they occur. Each individual will chose a movement and will and refine the movement to remain exceptional and to stand out from the rest, the movements such as these, which determine and enhance the performance of an athlete are called agile movements (Arau et al. 2004). The first Australian Women at the Olympics The 1956 Olympics was a major milestone for the women gymnasiums from Australia because the first participated and won a Gold medal. This formed a debut in the history of the sport in the country and at an international level. With the sport still juvenile and at its infant stages in Europe, the Australian women fought extremely hard and attained their position in the Australian team. This never came easily but was as a result of persistence, handwork and the motivation of the coaches acted as the fuel to the ladies team to achieve the feat of excellent preparation to the event which eventually leads to a successful outing(Aberneth & Wang, 1998). The Melbourne 1956 was an extra ordinary Olympics. It was the first Olympic held outside Europe or the US and the first one held in the southern hemisphere. This was the introduction of live coverage of the games and for the first time, the athletes were seen matching and walking together after the games were over. At this event, the performance of Australia kicked off with a brilliant start at the tracks with a brilliant performance from the female sprinters. The Golden girl, Cuthbert emerged a winner of 3 Gold medals at the event above all the other participants her performance was actually above the rest. Edwin Flack was the first individual to represent Australia at the Olympics in 1895 and went ahead to win gold at the summer games. Other athletes in the following Olympic Games, which have come afterwards, have henceforth redone this. References Abernethy B, Wann J, and Parks S. (1998). Training perceptual motor skills for sport. In: Training for Sport: Applying Sport Science. 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