What Is Shadow Boxing?

Series Summary

Since the dawn of time, men have been hitting each other with their fists. Boxing takes that prehistoric urge for fighting and molds it into a sport in which two boxers fight each other wearing boxing gloves, for a series of one to three minute rounds. Points are counted for each solid and legal blow, and a winner is named based on who is left standing in the ring, or by who has the most points. While the boxing ring sees it's share of participants' blood, boxing is sometimes called the sweet science because of the agility, grace and speed required of boxers. Learn how to shadow box to train for boxing matches in this free video series of shadow boxing techniques featuring boxer Billy Lefebvre. Lefebvre teaches the basic boxing stance for shadow boxing, why to shadow box with a mouthpiece, why it is important to relax while shadow boxing, basic shadow boxing breathing techniques, how to shadow box an imaginary opponent, how to shadow box in a mirror, how to shadow box another boxer and how to improve speed and accuracy while shadow boxing.

Video Transcript

"In this series on shadowboxing, we're going to be covering all the different things on why to shadowbox, how to shadowbox, when to shadowbox, and what you're going to get out of it. Shadowboxing is--the old adage is you see your shadow on the wall and your boxing against yourself, boxing against your own self. You can shadowbox in the mirror, you can shadowbox in the ring, you can shadowbox anywhere you can get a few minutes. We incorporate shadowboxing into approximately thirty rounds of a workout--over an hour an a half of two minute rounds. Shadowboxing--very important that it comes second. We do that jump roping first, after of course stretching--jump roping and then shadowboxing. So everybody does shadowboxing, and there are some exercises in boxing that we discontinue after we get used to them after awhile, however shadowboxing is not one of them."