Punchbag or threadmill

mrDerek

Which is better for cardio? i want to improve my fitness/stamina as its just dired when it comes to soccer.
i can run ona threadmill for ages but i do get much more wrecked and quicker using the punchbag but still i dont know if its just muscle fatigue that is tiring me so quick.

De_La_Jim

My guess is treadmill is better,the bag is building muscle in your arms so that's
not much use to you unless your looking to build muscle.

dave80

running for ages on a treadmill will do little for soccer, wat you need to do is sprints

something like this might help, on a pitch sprint from one corner to the half way, jog to next corner, sprint to the next corner, jog to the half way and so on, repeat circuit 3 times

Tigger

Did you mean: treadmill

Tigger

i like the punchbag for getting my heartrate up
more fun too

pwd

dave80 wrote: »

running for ages on a treadmill will do little for soccer, wat you need to do is sprints

something like this might help, on a pitch sprint from one corner to the half way, jog to next corner, sprint to the next corner, jog to the half way and so on, repeat circuit 3 times

this

Treadmills are not as good as running on ground. You don't need to push yourself along as much. Interval training like suggested is good for soccer, because it is similar to the sort of things you do while playing soccer. Conversely hitting a punchbag is fairly unrelated to soccer.
Interval training will increase your ability to run at speed over a distance. Impact training is excellent for strengthening tendons and ligaments, increasing bone density, and improving your ability to punch. I wouldn't think it's as relevant to training for soccer, as other exercises you could do instead.
Using a speed rope would probably be good; it would improve your agility and be similarly high-intensity traininng to the punchbag.

nullzero

Hitting a bag won't do a lot to improve your footballing abiltity, but if it's something you enjoy you could go a lot further wrong than to ask the lads in the boxing forum what you should be doing... http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/forumdisplay.php?f=568

As mentioned before the treadmill is no match for actual running. A Cross trainer would be better if you have access to one, it's more intense and adaptable than the treadmill. Actual running is the best thing for you regarding playing football. I play myself and i find the cross trainer is a good option for me for cardio because it lacks the impact on my knee's that jogging/running gives as I've had a couple of bad knee injuries over the past few years.
If you want to have speed you're going to have to train hard on your sprinting. It might all seem like hard work, but it's worth it.

I'm not sure if you're a member of a gym, but if you're not, joining would be a great benefit to you. A trainer could go through what's best for you one to one and give you a good programme to suit the needs of your football.

--amadeus--

I posted this ages ago ref GAA training but the same appleis for football:

--amadeus-- wrote: »

On the assumption that you have a medical green light to do cardio...

Cross training on teh bike and the stepper or whatever will give you improved CV fitness as well as burning cals to help with the weight loss.

It is however pretty pointless for GAA training. The Principle of Specificity says:

...to become better at a particular exercise or skill, you must perform that exercise or skill. A runner should train by running, a swimmer by swimming and a cyclist by cycling. While it's helpful to have a good base of fitness and to do general conditioning routines, if you want to be better at your sport, you need to train specifically for that sport.

(link)

Obviously that implies that you need ballwork to improve but you'll get that in the new year. What you need to replicate in training now are the non-skill, fitness demands of the sport. Essentially this is short sharp sprints in varied directions with longer slower (mainly) straight line running in between.

So that's what you should be doing. It's called Fartlek (Swedish for "Speedplay"). Specifically for GAA you should be running at easy pace (conversational, you should be able to talk at the speed you are running at) for a section then suddenly change direction and increase speed (perhaps to 75% of your max) and hold that speed for a period of time (maybe 20 - 30 secs), then back to an easy run. After a few minutes another rapid change of direction and this time sprint flat out for a shorter period of time, etc. Basically randomly change directions, speed and duration. Start off with as long a session as you can manage and add a few minutes each time. To build endurance lengthen the interval between sprints, to build speed add in more, longer and faster sprints.

A punchbag would be fun but pointless.

cowzerp

people saying that a punch bag would be pointless are clueless!

It may not be sport specific but in my experience Boxers can fit into any sport quite easily due to been used to training at higher intensitys than pretty much any other sport.

for example, 1 of the ladies i train done the mini marathon the other day and whipped last years time even though she did not train to run this year and only boxed, last year she trained running for the event, i know this sounds strange but she just found it so easy and could push harder due to been used to the boxing training.


Also when i used to do boxing and Football, the football training was like a warm up to me and helped me little towards my fitness due to me training boxing regular..

Im not saying that runners should all start boxing, but dont write boxing training off just because it does not seem similar.

pwd

cowzerp wrote: »

people saying that a punch bag would be pointless are clueless!

It may not be sport specific but in my experience Boxers can fit into any sport quite easily due to been used to training at higher intensitys than pretty much any other sport.

for example, 1 of the ladies i train done the mini marathon the other day and whipped last years time even though she did not train to run this year and only boxed, last year she trained running for the event, i know this sounds strange but she just found it so easy and could push harder due to been used to the boxing training.


Also when i used to do boxing and Football, the football training was like a warm up to me and helped me little towards my fitness due to me training boxing regular..

Im not saying that runners should all start boxing, but dont write boxing training off just because it does not seem similar.

It's not appropriate for training for soccer specifically. Using a speed rope would be much better, and provide the same or higher level of intensity.

baaaa

If you were to get a larger bag that you could kick as well as punch now that would be a different story.
Hip movement along with lateral movement would be improved immensely I'd imagine as they're generally performed repetitively under extreme fatigue on the bag.
Good for co ordination too and generating explosiveness in the scramble after the tackle.

AntiVirus

cowzerp wrote: »

for example, 1 of the ladies i train done the mini marathon the other day and whipped last years time even though she did not train to run this year and only boxed, last year she trained running for the event, i know this sounds strange but she just found it so easy and could push harder due to been used to the boxing training.

I'd say thats more to do with her being fitter this time. If she spent her time training to run instead of boxing she'd have run the mini marathon even faster.

I'd guess the treadmill would be better for endurance as your going to spend 90 minutes running around. If you want to get tired quicker on the treadmill up the speed to 15kmph.

cowzerp

AntiVirus wrote: »

I'd say thats more to do with her being fitter this time. If she spent her time training to run instead of boxing she'd have run the mini marathon even faster. .

Thats exactly why!
but she's fitter cause she trained boxing this time!

last time she did train running-thats my whole point.. she got fitter doing boxing than she could do through running, she knows how to run so the extra fitness let her push past her last years time..

pwd

cowzerp wrote: »

Thats exactly why!
but she's fitter cause she trained boxing this time!

last time she did train running-thats my whole point.. she got fitter doing boxing than she could do through running, she knows how to run so the extra fitness let her push past her last years time..

Doubt it. Never heard of serious runners training with a punchbag.

cowzerp

pwd wrote: »

Doubt it. Never heard of serious runners training with a punchbag.

Sorry, to explain-actual boxing training, not just a punch bag..

plus she is a girl who runs the mini marathon every year not a serious runner per se!

she was not expecting to beat her time as it was the 1st time she did not train for it specifically but did and easily she said..

Anyway i'm stating that experience and my point stands, dont write boxing off for fitness for pretty much anything, thats not to say not to specialise..

--amadeus--

cowzerp wrote: »

people saying that a punch bag would be pointless are clueless!

It may not be sport specific but in my experience Boxers can fit into any sport quite easily due to been used to training at higher intensitys than pretty much any other sport.

Well all those years I've been out doing 18 and 20 mile training runs and all I needed to do was a few rounds with a heavy bag :rolleyes:

I boxed when I was younger and I do a trad MA and run now. Boxing training gives great all round physical fitness and is training I would reccomend for anyone wanting all over conditioning.

However doing proper boxing training, in a gym, with a coach is one thing. Smacking a heavy bag at home a few times to "get fit" is *not* the same thing.

If the OP wants to improve thier fitness and stamina for soccer and is trying to choose between a treadmill and a punchbag then a punchbag is not the way to go.