P Is For Protective Gear

It's important to use the correct protective gear when boxing, be it on bag work, sparring or fighting in the ring.

The most obvious piece of protective equipment is the boxer's gloves. These come in various sizes which are dictated by weight. Personally I like to use 16oz gloves, but for white collar boxing match (that will be my W post) gloves are normally 12oz.

K Is For Knockout Centre

My boxing home is Knockout Centre in Strand, just a short journey from home, and I love this place run by the excellent Corné Blom.

Until recently we were part of the CEY family, but they needed the space for their growing Crossfit classes and the boxing side of things needed space to grow too, so it felt natural to separate the two out.

The biggest joy of now being in our own venue is that the boxing ring is back! At CEY the ring had to be sacrificed due to space demands so it's great to have it back.

Knockout Centre is the only gym in the Helderberg area with a proper boxing ring which speaks volumes about the quality of the place!

G Is For Guard

I touched briefly on this in my E Post on Evasion, but there is a bit more to say about the boxer's guard in the ring.

The guard is arguably the most important part of the boxers game, given that the defence and attack all spring from a good guard.

There are several different guards which can be employed by a boxer, but a good boxer will employ more than one, if not all of them at some point during a fight. 

B Is For Boxing

Boxing (or fighting) is probably as old as time along with prostitution and taxes.

The first record (or physical depiction) of boxing comes from around 3000BC in Mesopotamia (modern day Iraq). Since then there have been other notable ancient depictions of boxing and in 1650BC we have the first depiction of Boxing in front of spectators, dating back to Thebes in ancient Egypt.

The first illustration of boxers with gloves was seen on a fresco from the Minoan civilization dating back to the Bronze Age in Crete c1650BC.

The modern day sport of boxing as we would recognise it has some seriously dodgy roots and was pretty much outlawed within what we would know as *civilized society* through most of the 19th Century. In America, boxing's roots are directly traceable to the illicit world of gambling and casinos.

A Is For A Beginning

We all have to begin somewhere, so my beginning of the Blogging From A To Z April Challenge is "A Beginning". It's a bit of a cheat, but hey, we all have to start somewhere...

As I said in my Theme Reveal post, I'll be looking at my A To Z of Boxing. 

This isn't a definitive A to Z of boxing, rather it's an A to Z of my journey in boxing and my love of the sport, which was instilled by my Dad, himself a keen amateur boxer in his day, but more of him later in the month...

I Do Not Box...

Being able to box regularly again is worth celebrating, especially when I get to do it with Joel, so here's a post about our love of boxing...

There's a whole raft of reasons why I took up boxing.

Mostly it was about my health and fitness, I knew I couldn't (and didn't want to) do regular gym life, and having given up cycling I needed to do something to shake off the excess baggage that was gathering around my waist.

Post Father's Day Post

Had circumstances been different and my brothers and I had been able to live with our dad I know he would have introduced us to boxing from a young age.

Dad came from a notable line of amateur boxers in his hometown of Hawick in Scotland and even through the dark days of his illness he was always passionate about the sport.

So I'm quite chuffed with myself for having finally gotten around to taking up boxing, but I'm supper chuffed that Joel has now joined me and is also boxing at the same gym. That is a proud dad moment!

On The Road To Fitness

Having given up cycling about 8 years ago I knew I needed to get back in to a regular exercise programme, but until now had no idea as to what that would be given that enjoying it is very high on my list of priorities.

Let me be honest, I find the regular gym mind numbingly boring and I'm always amused by the thought that some people get stuck in traffic on their way to the gym to ride a stationary bike. I think it's fair to say that regular gym is definitely not for me.

For My Next Trick...

Having done the Cape Epic in 2009 and achieved a few other goals on my bikes I feel it's time for another challenge.

So here it is, my Nimbus 36" unicycle. The plan is to get fit enough to ride it in the Cape Argus next year 2013 to raise money for Miles 4 Smiles, a charity supported by my boys' school.

I've got a mountain to climb in terms of getting uni' fit, I need to fully master getting on it, especially in front of a crowd and I need to develop my core and thigh muscles to take the strain.

So far the furthest I've ridden on my 36er is a few laps around the school car park which is a million miles from riding the thing up Chapman's Peak or Suikerbossie.

Regardless of how tough it is I'm going to have a lot of fun along the way!

World Cup Fridays

As we gear up for the Rugby World Cup in New Zealand all school children in South Africa are allowed to wear rugby tops to school on Fridays.

Joel and Eli were really chuffed to get their Springbok tops this morning as they had been really disappointed having been told in no uncertain terms that football shirts would not be acceptable.

Eli Learns To Skateboard

Here's a few of Eli's earliest attempts at learning to ride his skateboard. He's desperate to go to the local skatepark and judging by his progress so far it won't be long before he's there. One senses a trip to the ER might be in the offing.

Swimming Lessons

Our boys have been having swimming lessons for a few seasons now and they have really paid off. So much so that when Eli recently fell into a swimming pool by accident he knew exactly what to do and saved himself. He actually emerged from the pool laughing. We weren't there at the time as he was at a friends house, needless to say our friend wasn't laughing!

Caption Competition

It's Friday afternoon and you really should be finishing off that crucial bit of work to meet the deadline, but somehow you strayed onto the web and ended up here.

So, whilst you're here why not get involved? Enter our Caption Competition and see if you can make us laugh.

Give it your best shot, see what you can come up with and leave your entry in the comments bit below.

No prizes, just a bit of fun.

Inappropriate comments will be deleted.

Number 21069

Runner 21069 was out and about on the streets and Lourensford wine estate in Somerset West doing her first ever 10 km road race! Yes, it's official, Paula went and chose the hottest day of summer so far (maxed at 38°C) to face her biggest challenge in the Run For Life Road Race/Half Marathon! Having trained for nothing in particular for the past 6 months or so, she was never going to be convinced that she could enter this sort of thing alone, so her dear husband decided to enter her instead.

Sports Day

Joel had his Sports Day at school today and it looks like the kids had a lot of fun. The idea came about because SA only came home with 1 medal from the Olympics and the school thought it had better do its bit to train the future 2016 athletes!! Somehow, we don't think Joel will be in the squad, but he certainly had a lot of fun trying.

The little ones had their own half hour of fun and it was amazing to see how competitive the 5 and 6 year olds could become!

Magnanimity In Victory - Not A South African Quality

To all the south African rugby fans out there.. you won! Not only did you win the World Cup but you deserved to win it. You played a great tournament and were generally entertaining to watch.

You won, live with it!

ENGLAND!

3-nil in the Euro 2008 qualifier and we stuffed the French 14-9 in Paris, oh what a sweet weekend!

My favourite quote of the whole weekend comes from Matt Dawson 72 minutes into the RWC semi-final:

"If the game carries on this way, England will steal it, I'm telling you, they will steal it. Stay patient England, stay patient."