How to Hit a Heavy Bag for Beginners in 2022

You have just got your heavy punching bag to keep you enthusiastic and active throughout the day. You just assembled the bag and are ready to take your exercise game to the next level. But wait! You don’t know the exact strategies and tricks to hit a bag. Having said that, as a novice you need to read our article about how to hit a heavy bag for beginners.

To achieve your fitness goals, you need to practice the correct method to hit the bag. We gathered the information about how to hit a heavy bag for beginners properly, so you don’t have to. We tried to make hitting pretty straightforward for beginners. Keep on reading to get your punching game strong.

Following are the tips you need to keep in mind while hitting the heavy bag:

Tips to Ace Your Hitting the Bag

1: Warm yourself up before punching

Warm-up before any sort of exercise is a crucial step as it prepares your muscles and increases stamina for hard workouts. Before starting to hit the bag, spend at least 5-10 minutes warming yourself up.

For that, you can jog at the spot sometimes. Moreover, you can stretch out your chest a little bit. Warming up will increase blood circulation throughout the body which helps you with muscle movement. Before jumping into strategies of how to hit a heavy bag for beginners, you need to give your body some heat for better movement.

2: Never forget gloves

Having fine-quality gloves will help you protect the muscles and ligaments of your hands. Gloves with thick thread provide a strong grip while hard punches. You’ll get yourself injured without wearing gloves.

If you want to get your pace perfect then keep practicing with good gloves. Good gloves will make you a good boxer.

3: Focus on the punching bag

When you’re an amateur who’s learning punching techniques then focus should be the first thing you need to grasp.

If you want to master the punching techniques then you should correct your eye habits. One important thing that beginners should avoid while hitting the heavy bag is staring at one spot too much or not looking at the bag at all.

You shouldn’t look at one spot throughout the practice because this bad eye habit may cause you trouble when you’re punching in front of your opponent. In the ring, your opponent can track your eye movement and make instant responses against your targeted area. You don’t want your opponent to telegraph your punches coming towards them. So, don’t look at the spot where you’re going to hit.

Another bad eye habit that may cause failure is not looking at the bag at all. Not looking at the punching won’t cause any good to you. Not paying attention to the opponent will affect your game badly as you can’t track the punches coming your way.

To get your strategy correct, you need to have your eye movement on the entire bag. You have to track the bag and keep it in view all the time. When you get over your bad eye habits, it means you’re ready to punch with the fullest. You’ll achieve your goal if you follow these guidelines on how to hit a heavy bag for beginners.

4: Balance yourself

While punching, try not to imbalance yourself. Don’t throw yourself at the bag, this way you won’t be able to keep yourself balanced. If you make this mistake, you won’t be able to stand at the ring for long. Throwing yourself at the opponent means you’re leaning/depending on your opponent. The opponent will take this as your weakness and try to imbalance you which in return makes you lose.

So, you should keep your body balanced and be in good posture. Don’t fall towards the punching bag because this way you can imbalance yourself. You need to pay attention to your feet, arms, and bag simultaneously. Don’t distract your mind and body while punching.

5: Place your feet on the ground while a punch

Feet on the ground gives you more power and more control while a punch. Try not to move around when you’re ready for a punch. You can move around the punching bag but when it’s time for a hard punch then keep your feet sturdy and at the place. The sturdy posture of your feet helps you pay attention to your target and gives you more mobility.

You can take smaller steps if you find it difficult to keep your feet in the ground while a punch. The boxing experts give a hard punch as they keep their feet at the place.

It’s important to be careful with your feet while hitting the heavy bag. If you don’t keep your feet on the ground, chances are that you’ll lose your balance which may cause injury. Such little effort will make you an expert at how to hit a heavy bag for beginners eventually.

6: Don’t push it. Punch it!

You should avoid pushing punches as your arms will get exhausted faster. If your punch moves the bag all over the place then you are doing it wrong. You need a snapping punch to make it right. Snapping punch will keep the bag in place and make a big smacking sound. This is what you need in your punch.

You don’t need a dull thud sound coming from a punching ball after a hit. You need a huge smacking sound coming from your punch. An expert can judge your punching skills by only listening to the sound punching bag.

7: Keep a certain distance

Maintain the necessary distance from a punching bag. Track the movement of the punching ball and try to follow the direction of the bag. Don’t be lazy while you practice. Keep in mind that you need to make a proper distance to your opponent. Don’t let the bag come too close or get too far from your arms.

You need to develop better footwork to get better at punching games. Move your legs and feet swiftly and follow the punching bag direction. If you can’t adopt this kind of footwork, then try to decrease the intensity of your punches. The development of stable footwork is one of the most fundamental strategies of punching workouts.

8: Move away after the attack

Move away from the bag right after the moment you attack. Move your legs and don’t wait to get attacked by the bag. Punching continuously like a mad person is not a good technique either. So don’t do any of these.

Moving away after a punch is one of the good techniques which allow you to chase the opponent’s next movement. Don’t let your opponent track your movement at all.

9: Don’t wait

There’s no reason not to add this vital tip in our how to hit a heavy bag for beginners guide. Just don’t wait! Yeah that’s the key to ace the punching skills. Waiting after a punch means you’re allowing your opponent to throw at you. You shouldn’t be doing that. Your opponent will start punching, watching you rest for 4-8 seconds.

Experts never stop or wait, they are always throwing at the opponent. When they rest, it would only be 1-2 seconds maximum. Even at their resting state, they keep throwing smaller punches.

Beginners try to wait for 5-10 seconds after a few hits. You shouldn’t make this your habit if you want to be good at your game. Nobody is going to wait for you this long between combinations. So, NEVER STOP PUNCHING. Just keep throwing no matter what.

10: Less Power More Breathing

Breathing has a lot to do with your punching strategy. When your only focus is hitting as hard as possible then you’ll get tired shortly. You need to focus on your breathing rhythm as well. Stay calm and focused on your breathing, this way you won’t get exhausted faster.

Good breathing makes a visible difference in your punching techniques. You need to track your breathing so that you can conserve your energy while punching. There’s no need to use maximum power to hit the bag, this approach won’t do any good to your skill. You need to have endurance and tolerance throughout the game.

Endurance and tolerance come with relaxed breathing. Good breathing helps you achieve good technique. Now, good technique is the first and only way to ace punching.

11: Be active when you rest

When I started punching, I used to rest after every few hits and that too leaning on the bag. I learned the hard way that I need to be active even when I’m resting for a few seconds. So, just don’t stay still after getting exhausted. Throw smaller and lighter punches at the bag at your resting time. But DO NOT STAND STILL.

As a beginner, you need to understand that resting time with no punches can be used against you by your opponent.

“Just keep moving and keep throwing“

Final thoughts:

Now we hope that you know the basic tips and tricks about hitting the bag as a learner. Keep all these points in your mind while you punch. If you focus on everything with a relaxed mind then there’s hope that you can ace punching. Hitting the heavy bag is not that difficult, you just need to track down the movement of the bag with good breathing and just move around when you are not punching. That’s all and you’re going to rock the punching game. We hope that our little effort did some good to your punching techniques.