What is Padwork?
Pad work is a martial arts-based approach to fitness that uses training mitts or boxing gloves and pads as the basis for a workout programmed around the use of combat skills training and techniques. Pad work is extremely popular with clients who want to lose weight whilst building strength, without spending hours on cardio machines. This combat style of fitness training is suitable for anyone and anywhere and is great for cardiovascular fitness, muscular strength and endurance, motor skills and flexibility.
The Benefits Of Pad Work
1. Stress Relief
It’s no secret that exercise causes the release of endorphins, the feel-good hormones! It’s also a great mood booster generally, it works as a form of meditation, and improves sleep. All of which helps to reduce and manage stress. When you’re focusing and pushing yourself through a couple minutes of high-intensity punching, you don’t have much mental space left to worry about work or stress about relationships. Punching the pads can help you release any pent up negative emotions you might be storing, so if you’re not in a great place, it is a great way to transform your mood, Those endorphins will be flowing for hours after your workout too!
2. Improves Hand-Eye Coordination
If you have good hand-eye coordination, you’re likely to have quick reflexes and reaction times. This is an important skill to work on, especially as we age, as coordination and balance become compromised, increasing the risk of falls. Pad work is a fantastic way to improve your hand-eye coordination because when you’re hitting the pads, you must be able to see, react to, and hit the constantly moving and changing target. Pads provide a much smaller target (than a bag) so require maximum attention from the boxer to punch on target. It is therefore a must for anyone wanting to develop their accuracy in boxing. It’s certainly challenging, but with practice on the pads, your hand-eye coordination will improve considerably!
3. Improved Cardiovascular Fitness
Cardiovascular exercise is any vigorous activity that increases your heart rate and respiration and raises oxygen and blood flow throughout the body while using the body’s large muscle groups. Cardio offers a plethora of benefits from reducing health risks to lowering blood pressure. The combos strung together in pad work effectively ramp up your heart rate in a short space of time. It is a high intensity, low impact form of interval training that is guaranteed to improve your stamina and fitness levels.
4. Improves Total Body Strength
All that jabbing and hooking requires a surprising amount of strength! Participating in regular pad work sessions will lead to a significant increase in body strength in a fairly short period of time!
5. Aids Weight Loss
Due to its high intensity nature, Pad work is a great way to burn a large number of calories in a short amount of time. Owing to the resistance element of the workout, Pad work can also be a great way at building a certain amount of muscle, particularly for people who are new to exercise. Whilst you cannot necessarily continue building after a certain baseline has been achieved, it can lead to an overall improvement in body composition provided that your diet is on point.
6. Mental Stimulation
During pad work sessions you will be required to remember and practice sequences and combinations which makes pad work not just a great physical workout, but it’s also fantastic for improving concentration and cognitive skills too.
Frequently Asked Question
Find the answers to common questions about Pad Work below.
Since pad work is a full-body workout, it may seem logical that punching a bag will also build muscle, but this is generally not the case. If you are new to exercise and generally quite inactive, it is likely that any new stimulus which challenges your muscles will enable you to build a baseline level of muscle. However, muscle growth requires high levels of mechanical tension and metabolic stress. Mechanical tension is generated when the muscle is taken to, or close to, failure, through a full range of motion under tension. Metabolic stress on the other hand is that “burning” sensation you get in those last couple of reps during a set. It is the build-up of by-products within the muscle that negatively affects force production but stimulates muscle growth. So, whilst punching a pad may provide high resistance and cause a burning sensation in your arms, there is not enough resistance to induce muscle growth. Therefore, if you are looking to build muscle you should think about supplementing pad work with resistance training.
While burning fat predominantly boils down to the balance between your dietary intake and energy expenditure, i.e. burning more calories than you eat, pad work is a fun way to expend a good amount of calories in a short amount of time without spending hours on cardio machines. So provided that you are in a calorie deficit, pad work is great for improving body composition – and is great for weight loss.
Although gloves and pads will be provided, hand wraps will not. A hand wrap, or wrist wrap, is a strip of cloth used to protect your hand and wrist against injuries induced by punching. Your hands are made up of many fragile joints and delicate bones that could easily break from the impact of repeated punches. Hand wraps are there to hold your hand together, providing support for your fingers, knuckles, wrists, and the entire hand itself. On average hand wraps cost around £10 and can be purchased easily online.
Pad work can be incorporated into your training as a warm up, the main session or as a conditioning finisher.
If you are curious or want to find out more about adding pad work into your training, schedule a free consultation below with no obligation.