Author: The Ring Team

In light of COVID-19, we have all had to adjust to the ‘new norm’ and have found the lines between work and home life increasingly blurred. With more time spent at home, we may find regular exercise slipping off our to-do list. 

However, if working more at home has left you feeling less energetic, moody or you have even found yourself suffering from anxiety or depression – a little exercise during the week could be the key to help you feel more like you again! Whilst boxing has a multitude of physical benefits from increasing your strength to building stamina, did you know that it can also be beneficial to your mental health? 

Read on below to find out how training at The Ring could help you to relieve stress, sleep better and even increase your self-confidence during this unprecedented time:

MANAGE STRESS & ANGER

Working at home, it can be tempting to sit on the sofa and put your boxing workout on the back burner for another day. However, it’s especially important to stay active during this time. 

By making boxing a regular part of our daily routines we can take ourselves out of the current situation and instead be in the present moment, focussing on the task at hand – a moment to switch off from the outside world and any stress, anxiety or anger you might be feeling. Any form of movement can help, but you’re more likely to experience a bigger benefit if you are focussed – allowing you to interrupt the flow of worries occurring in your mind.

In addition to being in the present moment, boxing, as a form of exercise, releases the production of endorphins and helps to relieve any muscle tension which is felt when stressed. These ‘feel-good’ hormones will help you to relax and forget your worries, for at least for a little while.

SHARPER MEMORY & BETTER SLEEP

Without an office environment, are you finding yourself less focused on your work, procrastinating and becoming distracted by your home surroundings? Those same ‘feel-good’ endorphins that make you more positive can also help your concentration and help you to be more mentally sharp. If you’re struggling to stay focused, a quick boxing workout can give you a productive break from your laptop and help you to complete tasks more efficiently when you return to your desk.

As a form of high-intensity cardiovascular exercise, boxing can also help to improve the quality of your sleep. A good night’s sleep is essential for your brain and cognitive function – ensuring that you’re rejuvenated and energised for the day ahead.

OVERCOME CHALLENGES

In light of COVID-19 we are facing more challenges than ever before. And, there are many examples of people who have turned to boxing to help them overcome challenges they have faced. Each punch of the bag can really make you feel empowered – helping you to build confidence in yourself and your abilities. By meeting your fitness goals, you’ll feel a sense of achievement and be ready to take on whatever challenges the day throws at you.

As studies have shown, all forms of regular exercise have a positive impact on your mental health. Boxing in particular can have a cathartic and therapeutic effect on both your mind and body as you are able to ‘take it out on the bag.’ With more time spent at home than ever before, this is something we all need more than ever to help us to relieve stress and become more focused. Find out for yourself by booking a class at The Ring and get ready to punch your worries away! Boxing Singapore with the Ring!

Have you ever taken an extended hiatus from the gym and tried to jump straight back into your regular gym session or fitness class? You may have been shocked to find how quickly you had lost your stamina and strength.

In light of the current pandemic, many of us have tried to keep up our training intensity from home via live Instagram or Zoom workouts. However, without the energy of our trainers face to face and without our training partners and friends alongside us, the intensity which we have been training with at home may not have matched up to the same intensity we trained at in our favourite gym. Also, with such a drastic change to our routines, many of us have also lacked motivation during this time to train at all. 

With the gyms reopening, if you’re looking to head back to train once again, be careful of jumping back into it too fast too soon as this could lead to sore muscles and even injury which could see you taking an unwanted break from the gym for another couple of months.

Read below for our top 5 tips to help you get back to your fitness routine and regain your pre-circuit breaker strength:

WARM UP

Every gym session should be preceded with a warm-up to safely prepare your muscles for the work ahead – if you’ve had some time off, a warm-up is even more important to increase blood flow and support mobility. At The Ring, we make sure your warm-up is an essential part of your workout by incorporating skipping, shadow boxing and active stretching at the start of every session.

SLOW AND STEADY

If you haven’t been exercising, you will have lost muscle mass so it is important to decrease the intensity of your workouts. To prevent injury after time off from the gym, make sure to start slow and focus on increasing the intensity and strength one session at a time. 

STRENGTH TRAINING

If you’ve spent a lot of time sedentary and lost muscle mass, incorporating light strength training into your workout will help to rebuild your muscle – particularly in those areas in your posterior chain. These muscles are essential for everyday movements. By focusing on strength exercises for your posterior chain, your posture, core strength, as well as strength in your glutes and hamstrings will improve – making you less prone to injury as you transition back to your fitness routine.

RECOVERY

It is important to recover properly after your workout to allow your muscles to rebuild, particularly if they’re working at a higher intensity than normal. If your muscles are not used to training, you will experience DOMS (delayed onset muscle soreness), which is likely to leave you sore for 24-72 hours post workout. Recover well by drinking water and upping your protein intake to help minimise the soreness you will feel, particularly after your first workout back. 

LISTEN TO YOUR BODY

Lastly – be patient with yourself! The pandemic has forced us all to find new routines and new ways of training whilst at home. If you find yourself not at your previous fitness level, focus on the small victories and work towards rebuilding your strength. Keep your goals realistic and look after your body as it begins to readjust to a new routine. Before you know it, you’ll be hitting your personal best once again.

Our trainers at The Ring, Your Boxing Gym in Singapore, are here to help you return safely back to the gym at a pace which suits you. If it’s your first time back let us know and we will guide you through your first workout. We can’t wait to welcome you back!

We all know that exercise is beneficial for our health. It helps to keep us strong, maintain a healthy weight as well as improve our mental wellbeing. It is also thought that exercise helps to mobilise the white blood cells in our body so that they can fight off any germs or infections we might be exposed to. And, in light of COVID-19, a strong immune system is more important than ever. But can your workout also hinder your bodies’ ability to fight off infections?

IMPACTS ON IMMUNITY

Exercise could make you more susceptible to infections and compromise your immune system – but only if you’re training particularly hard. Research has shown that more than 90 minutes of high-intensity endurance exercise, for example, marathon or triathlon runners, are more likely to catch a virus for up to 72 hours after their workout. A workout of such high intensity is stressful on your body and leads it to produce stress hormones – cortisol and adrenaline, raise blood pressure and suppress your immune system. 

This will also affect all you fitness enthusiasts, if you are overtraining hard for an extended period of time you can also make yourself more susceptible to catching a bug or virus as it may cause fatigue. 

In addition, so that it’s not a shock to the system, if you don’t currently train regularly, make sure to start your fitness regime gradually to allow your body time to adjust.  And, if you are already unwell, it is also best to avoid exercise and let your immune system focus on fighting the infection.

However, if you make sure to incorporate rest and recovery into your exercise regime, you will be able to maintain a healthy immune system. It is important to strike the right balance between exercise and recovery and this includes eating nutrient-dense foods before and after working out to ensure that you are replenishing your body with the protein, carbohydrates and other vital nutrients it needs to recover.

BENEFITS FOR IMMUNITY

Whilst regular high-intensity workouts and overtraining could be detrimental to your health and the strength of your immune system, regular and moderate exercise has many benefits for our body. In fact, it can lower your risk of infection. 

Moderate exercise, approximately thirty minutes a day for three times a week, enhances the movement of white blood cells throughout the body, this helps to strengthen your immune system by allowing these cells to do their job efficiently. If repeated regularly, this can lead to fewer illnesses and less inflammation of the body in the long term.

Working out will also help you to maintain a healthy weight which is essential for the overall health of your body and its organs. It will also release endorphins, the happy hormones, which in turn improves your sleep quality and reduces stress levels – two other known components that can compromise our immune systems. When a consistent workout routine is combined with regular sleep and the intake of healthy food, you have a recipe for success for a healthy immune system.

Be physically active every day, whether that involves walking, running, a trip to the gym, a boxing class or even just gardening. Just be mindful of overdoing it as too much exercise can actually be detrimental. You can join The Ring @ Home and workout with our coaches and community! Remember to allow your body and your immune system time to recover, particularly after ‘stressful’ high-intensity workouts. 

Keep your body moving, it will thank you! 

The Circuit Breaker has meant a huge shift to our normal training sessions. Without our gyms, fitness studios, and limited time to spend outside, we are now figuring out how to stay healthy and keep fit from the comfort of our home. Trying to get an effective full-body workout in beyond our usual gyms can be tricky, both in terms of a lack of gym equipment we are used to and a decline in motivation when we’re no longer training with coaches, having a familiar atmosphere and faces around us. 

However, without exercise and a routine, our minds might be less able to face the challenging times we are currently confronted with. Exercise is more crucial than ever in helping us to build mental resilience.  

If you already had a fitness routine before the Circuit Breaker, adjusting the transition is not as difficult as you might think. And, if you are looking to adopt a healthier lifestyle during your time at home, there is no better time to begin.

Nelson Mandela: A Boxer

This week, we look to Nelson Mandela for inspiration and motivation. Did you know that during his incarceration on Robben Island he looked towards exercise to help him through the time? 

Mandela had started boxing whilst he was a student at Fort Hare University and he carried on his boxing training and routine, which had previously taken place in a Soweto boxing gym, every week Monday to Thursday whilst still in prison. 

He attempted to follow his boxing routine starting with running on the spot for 45 minutes, 100 Fingertip Push-Ups, 200 Sit-ups and other calisthenic exercises.

In fact, Mandela believed that exercise was fundamental to both his physical and mental health – “exercise dissipates tension, and tension is the enemy of serenity. I found that I worked better and thought more clearly when I was in good physical condition, and so training became one of the inflexible disciplines of my life.”

Building Resilience

The news of the coronavirus pandemic and the subsequent directives from the government have left many of us experiencing negative emotions. As for Mandela, exercise could be the key to helping us face these difficult times. Research has demonstrated that exercise and good nutrition are both directly linked to our emotional well-being.

It provides us with an outlet for the anxiety and worries we are all confronted with at the moment. We must learn to adapt and be resilient during these challenging times. For those of us who are living in a confined space, it is time to get creative with our workouts. If you are limited to a confined space, no-equipment exercise routines are a great place to start.

Staying Motivated  with The Ring @ Home Series

Don’t let a change in your usual routine leave you feeling unmotivated. Use this time to build a new routine. Our advice is to schedule in your home workout session as if it is a work call or appointment. Your new routine will provide you with the mental strength you need to get through this!

And, scheduling your home workout session just got easier with the launch of our The Ring @ Home series. You’ll be reunited (albeit virtually) with your favourite trainers and fellow Ring members as we workout together online via a Zoom class. Find out more here. 

Finally, remember that nothing lasts forever, this too shall pass! Let’s all take inspiration from Mandela as we go forward into this new month and week.

If your goal is to lose weight, chances are that you have tried a diet regime before only to eventually put the weight back on, perhaps even faster than it took to lose it. There are numerous fad diets out there all claiming to help you lose weight but aren’t effective in helping you to keep it off!

If you’re looking to shed those unwanted pounds, it is important to remember to be kind to yourself in the process. Work hard at it and be proud of the small accomplishments which you achieve on your journey.

Read below for our tips on how to lose weight AND keep it off:

MAKE IT A LIFESTYLE

The word diet in itself has many negative connotations and before you’ve even started the thought of a diet brings up ideas of a short term fix and suffering in the process. In order to actually lose weight and maintain it, you need to make permanent and sustainable changes to the way you eat. 

Everything in moderation! Don’t restrict yourself to a fad diet or make such drastic changes that you are unable to stick to your new way of eating, indulge yourself sometimes with a ‘cheat’ snack or meal, this will help you to keep on track in the long term. 

MINDSET

In order to maintain your weight in the long term, your mindset is crucial. Everyone slips up occasionally and no one is perfect, however the way you face the slip up is key. Face the slip up with a positive attitude and know that you will get back to normal the next day. If you stick at it, over time healthy eating habits will start to become routine.

PROTEIN AND FATS

As part of your diet, make sure to incorporate protein and plant-based fats. These two ingredients, along with fresh fruit and vegetables, will help to keep you feeling fuller for longer. Incorporate protein and plant-based fats in every meal you consume, as much as possible.

By failing to prepare you are preparing to fail. Therefore, it is also helpful to plan your meals in advance and have healthier, lower-calorie foods on hand at all times so that there is less temptation to consume less nutritious food. Keep track of your foods using a food tracking app on your phone and this will help you to stay accountable.

REST AND RECOVER

When you’re stressed and tired your body begins to produce more cortisol, a stress hormone that can cause you to crave carbohydrates and to fall off the diet wagon.

Make sleep a priority in your life to help you focus on your diet regime and help you to maintain it. Research has shown that aiming for approximately seven hours sleep a night can help to lower your stress levels, lowering cortisol levels and therefore helping you to maintain your diet.

EXERCISE

Finally, make sure you keep active! Losing weight involves working out to burn calories, burn fat and boost your metabolism. However, don’t just stick to cardio! In fact, it is the building of muscle which will help to boost your metabolism in the long term. Swap those hours on the crosstrainer for strength and interval training instead – a full-body cardio and strength workout like boxing is perfect!

It’s Week 3 of the Circuit Breaker and many of us are itching to get back into the gym and worrying about how to train without our usual gym equipment or coaching advice from our instructors. If you have made it a goal to keep training in order to maintain your fitness and strength, your usual workout regime will need to be adjusted. The good news is that many useful boxing techniques can be adapted from your usual boxing workouts in the gym and transferred to your living room.

Read below for our advice on where to start even if you have no equipment at home during this time.

Shadowboxing

Whilst you may not have your usual bags, pads or sparring partner, we recommend keeping up that technique by shadowboxing. 

Shadowboxing will challenge your speed and power without the resistance of the bag. Focus on high reps, throw those punches with a variety of different combinations and move around the room to keep your feet nimble and to get your heart rate up. You can even increase the intensity by holding weights in each hand.

Skipping without a skipping rope

A skipping rope is a staple part of many boxing workouts and your training. It is the perfect way to incorporate a cardio workout into your home training, requires very little space, and again helps to loosen up your feet. 

If you don’t have a skipping rope at home or if you don’t have the ceiling height to be able to skip, you can imitate the movements of skipping by moving your hands at the wrist as if you were jumping over a rope. 

Other alternatives, if you don’t have a jump rope, are jumping jacks, mountain climbers or high knees.

Interval Training

Interval training and working with your bodyweight are a great way to raise your heart rate, helping you to maintain your cardio progress. Download an Interval Timer on your phone and schedule three minutes of work followed by one minute of rest.

If you want more of a challenge, you can up the time you’re working for and reduce your rest periods.

Incorporate a variety of bodyweight exercises such as boxer burpees, push-ups, planks and squat jumps to really make you sweat.

Get Creative With Household Equipment

No weights? No problem! You might not have your usual weights and gym equipment but you can still get in a great workout using some of your handy household items. Substitute your usual hand weights by using water bottles or substitute a kettlebell by filling up a duffel bag or by using a full bottle of detergent.

We encourage you to get creative and transform your living room into the best home gym it can be. Check out some common household items that can double up as home workout equipment!

IGTV Home Workout Videos

If you’re missing the social aspect of training and working with your trainers and sparring partners, or just need a bit of extra motivation to get you going, a virtual workout is the answer! Head over to our Instagram page @thering_sg and take part in our IGTV Boxing Home Workout Videos. It’s the next best thing to being in The Ring with your favourite coaches and you’ll learn new tips and techniques along the way!

As a result of the COVID-19 outbreak, the majority of us will be required to work from home. For many of us, we will have to begin to adjust to this new way of working without the discipline which comes from working in an office. 

Being in your personal space and not your professional environment can bring many distractions, from household chores to watching that Netflix series everyone is talking about. 

Here are our 5 tips for staying productive while working from home:

1. Formulate a Morning Routine

Use the first hours of the day wisely! Your usual commute to work is often a valuable way for people to transition from home life to work life. Create your own commute and set some time at the beginning of the day to help you get into work mode.

This time could be used to get in some morning movement, to mediate or have breakfast. Wake your body up and wake your mind up by having a routine before you sit at your desk and start work.

2. Get Dressed

Although it is tempting to stay in your pyjamas for the whole day, make a concerted effort to change into normal clothes. Wear something which will make you feel more professional and this will help you to get yourself into the mindset that you have a day of work ahead of you.

Getting dressed will help to turn on that productivity switch which we need to get going when working from home.

3. Designated Workspace

One of the keys to being productive at home is to create an environment free from distractions where you can focus on your to-do list.  Do not work on the sofa or in your bed and instead find a comfortable space that you can associate with your job, by doing so you can create a clear boundary between work and home life. 

Make your space a quiet zone where you can concentrate and keep that space free of clutter and distractions. For example, try not to have the TV or music on in the background and consider putting your phone on airplane mode when working on your laptop.

4. Scheduling Your Time

Working from home can be filled with distractions. In the morning, don’t just roll out of bed without a plan, make a schedule the night before. Set the hours you are going to work for the day and build your schedule into these hours. 

Also schedule in your exercise, your morning routine and when you’re going to switch off. Household chores can also quickly eat into your workday and make you less productive so be sure to schedule time for these too so you don’t use up too much of your day.

Having a schedule can keep you focused and motivated but remember to be realistic. Don’t set yourself too many tasks in one day as you don’t want to feel guilty when you want to switch off in the evening. 

5. Avoid Cabin Fever

Now that you are spending the majority of your time in the home, try to also spend time going on a walk or visiting a nearby park – remember to maintain social distancing! Spending some time in nature can help you to relax and clear your mind, in turn making you more productive and creative when you sit back at your desk.

During this time of uncertainty, it’s understandable that you might be feeling anxiety in relation to the coronavirus crisis. This uncertainty, coupled with instability and a change or loss of our daily routine can be difficult on our mental health.

To help put your mind at ease, here are our tips on how to manage any heightened emotions which you are experiencing at the moment.

CONTROL YOUR THOUGHTS

Our daily habits such as going to the gym or catching up with friends is no longer an option for many of us. Some of us have had to cancel special celebrations like weddings and graduations and we are worrying about becoming sick which can cause us to become ill as a result. All this can be stressful and overwhelming. It can be easy for our minds to focus on the negatives. 

In light of this, we can work to control our thoughts and, if you feel panicked, it can be helpful to take a few deep breaths or talk to someone close to you about how you are feeling so that your negative thoughts don’t consume you.

LIMIT CONSUMPTION OF MEDIA

If you are struggling with anxiety, limit your exposure to the news and social media. Try to limit what you watch, read and listen to to just once a day. Whilst it is important to stay up to date on the virus, if you are struggling to cope, take care of your mental health and give yourself a break from your online life for a while.

Instead, take yourself offline by reading a book, taking a walk in nature or spending some time with loved ones whilst still practising social distancing.

FOCUS ON FACTS

When you do turn on the news and read social media updates, try to avoid any speculation and remain focussed on the facts. There can be so much misinformation out there which can add to you feeling overwhelmed.

Rely instead on trusted forms of communication, such as the World Health Organization, and remember to give yourself a break from both the news and social media every once in a while.

STAY CONNECTED 

Whilst social distancing requires us to stay home to help reduce the spread of the virus, we can still stay connected with friends, family and loved ones online.

Human beings need to feel connected to feel happy. Keep in touch via phone calls or through video messaging and talk about other topics which will help to lift your spirits. Whilst you need support, you can also be a support system to those around you

SELF-CARE

During this time it is important to try to stick to healthy behaviours like a good diet and sleep. Make sure you also take time for yourself, whether that involves exercise, meditation or having a long bath. And, try to do things consistently and create a regular routine to help you get into a good headspace as this will help you to feel more in control.

And remember that we will all still have the same time in the day. Whilst we can’t control the situation, we can focus on ways to calm ourselves down and find peace of mind. Use this time to your advantage and do things you wouldn’t have done before. By adapting to your new temporary way of life, you can focus on working to benefit your future with the time which may have been restricted to you before.

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