Essential boxing equipment

What are the qualities of someone who can excel in the sport of boxing? Most likely, someone who is willing to much time, energy, talent, and patience into becoming one – and that means being willing to train long hours over many months, even years, to become an excellent boxer.

But that is not all that is required to excel in boxing – you also need to have the right boxing equipment to be able to train. It would be pretty hard to train without some necessary boxing equipment.

The first boxing equipment you need are a speed bag and a heavy bag to throw punches at daily.

A mirror is essential boxing equipment, so you can do shadowboxing.

You should get a jump rope (the kind only pros use, mind, not the type for grade-school children) so you can skip rope as part of your training. This type of boxing equipment allows you to develop agility.

A workout suit is necessary boxing equipment when you go jogging, especially since many boxers go jogging in the early hours of the morning when it is quite chilly. Choose one whose top has a hood so you can keep your head warm too. Then you have to complement such boxing equipment with thick cotton socks (so your feet don’t chafe as you go jogging long miles over many hours) and rubber shoes that are pretty heavy duty. If you can get cross-training shoes, those are the best kind because they tend to absorb a lot of the punishment from jogging on hard concrete roads.

The shoes you need as boxing equipment for the ring will be different of course.

A well-calibrated weighing scale is a very important piece of boxing equipment because boxers fight based on what weight category they belong to. You should also have a record book or diary where you can jot down what your weight is for that day, at what time, what you had to eat, and how you trained. This gives you a clear idea of where you are at your training, especially if you are training to become a professional boxer.

When sparring, it is very important to have protective gear as your protective boxing equipment because you don’t want to get injured prior to a big fight – you just want to stay in shape for the fight. A groin-guard (like a sport cup) is very necessary boxing equipment for male boxers (but naturally not for female boxers), along with a head-guard and mouth guard. Among these three, the mouth guard and head-guard are the most important boxing equipment. The mouth guard prevents your teeth from getting accidentally knocked out by a blow to the head, and a head-guard prevents your head from being knocked about too much during the sparring session. (Of course, during real pro matches, no head guards are allowed, only mouth guards. So you may want to do some training without a head guard just to get a feel for it.)

Naturally, no boxer would be caught without any gloves. But gloves as boxing equipment don’t all fall into one generic category. There are speed bag gloves, heavy bag gloves, and sparring gloves that all boxers have to use at some point. You also need hand wraps to wrap your wrists and knuckles with prior to putting your hands in the gloves, as another type of precautionary boxing equipment.

But of course the most essential boxing equipment is your own willpower, the ability to take punches and return the same to your opponent, and willingness to devote yourself to training. Without these three, all the boxing equipment in the world cannot make you into a better boxer.