How to stay composed in the Ring

So recently I went down to a boxing club for some sparring, it had been a good few months since I did any hard sparring and a good few weeks since I had done any sort of easy paced technical sparring. As the bell rang for round one of the spar, very quickly it developed into a brawl, almost taking turns to load up on punches and unleash a volley of shots at each other, the head movement was non existent, the hands were winding up trying to pack power in the shots and just as quickly your cardio is sucked out of you as fighting at such a high and intense pace is impossible to sustain.
By the end of round one I was tired! Why? Because I failed to compose myself, resulting in me wasting energy, wasting shots and getting hit with shots I wouldn’t normally be tagged with.

How does one avoid these pitfalls and ensure they are not losing control when fighting? It can be pretty difficult at the best of times because of the nature of the fight, it isn’t football where you can run up and down the pitch and kick a ball, this is a sport in which you are fighting another person, you are getting hurt, sometimes both physically and mentally and it can be more mentally challenging than anything to restrain yourself when you are hit and try to hurt your opponent back, when doing this could result in your falling right into the hands of your opponent.

Composing yourself in a fight is extremely important, yes you have to be aggressive but you have to control your aggression else you will leave yourself open to counter attacks. Part of this does come down to experience, new fighters often become engaged in brawls, whether it is their first spar or their first fight, the natural instinct is to fight back when you are tagged or fight hard as soon as you see your opponent in front of you, the pressure of having eyes in the crowd or in the gym, all watching you can also put you off your game plan but there are a few tips you can use to help you stay calm in the ring.

Pre-fight different fighters have different rituals, some like to lie down and rest in the changing rooms, some like to use affirmations and self talk, that is all well and good before the fight but we want to know how to compose ourselves when the action gets started inside the ring, like Mike Tyson said ‘everyone has a plan until they get punched in the face’ We want to have plans in place so that when we do get caught with a shot, we don’t go away from our game plan and we stick to it.

Have a short memory. If you get caught with a shot, don’t let it put you off your plan, don’t think ‘I have to punch them back right now as revenge!’ Forget about it, continue with your game plan and move on, if you have created a strategy to beat your opponent then don’t let a punch or two take you away from your strategy. Getting involved in brawls is the surest way to end up with being knocked out as you will only walk into shots. If you are feeling rushed and having to defend yourself from shots, keep your eyes on your opponent, keep your guard tight, get out of range and breath before planning your next attack. Once you are composed and relaxed again, then you can look to counter your opponents shots.

Don’t fight angry. I know this appears to be against the grain of certain fighters but the key word here is controlled aggression, yes you can be ‘angry’ but you cannot be out of control angry. The anger cannot be so much that it effects the way you box, if you have a naturally aggressive fighting style, then you should still be able to fight in the exact same manner. Mike Tyson is a good example of this, he wanted to knock you out with every punch and yes he was angry and looked like he hated you and wanted to kill you, but a prime Mike Tyson was controlled, he picked his shots, moved his head, made you miss and then he countered – he controlled his aggression, his offence and his defence. Leave your ego at the door.

Control the distance. Be aware of your movement, control the distance. If you are controlling the distance, you are controlling the fight, don’t go chasing your opponent, keep them in front of you and that will help to compose you and fight at the tempo you want to fight at. If you go chasing your opponent and following them around the ring as opposed to cutting off the ring and controlling the range then you are more likely to get agitated and dive into an exchange. You will get itchy feet so to speak and again that will cause you to take unnecessary risks trying to close the gap to land a shot which means an increased risk of taking a shot.
If you controlling the distance then you will also be controlling the range which means you will be better able to control your breathing, that of course will help you to prevent yourself from gassing out too quickly.

Practice makes perfect. As touched upon earlier in the article, a lot of being composed in the ring is simply having been through it before and learning from experience, some of it is also ring rust, so this goes hand in hand, keep sparring, keep fighting and keep sharp. If you have a period of weeks or months in which you haven’t sparred, don’t go into sparring at full pace, slow it down to jabs only, body shots only, lead hand only and ease into full sparring, work on the technical side first, you could even use technical drills for controlling the distance which will of course help you to compose yourself for the competitive bouts.

So remember to keep your cool in the ring and you will be much better able to fight to the best of your abilities! If you want to take a look at some fighters I recommend who are calm and composed in the ring, then names such as Floyd Mayweather Jnr, Juan Manual Marquez, James Toney, Lennox Lewis and Pernell Whitaker immediately spring to mind.