Wrap hands like Sergio Martinez

[gauzyhanz]

I've seen a few clips of Sergio Martinez training and he seems to use a very minimalistic style for wrapping his hands. He just uses a single mexican handwrap for each hand, which isn't out of the ordinary, but he never seems to wraps his thumb. I guess i've hear of people who choose to skip wrapping there thumb, but it is surprising to me that a pro boxer whould wraps his hands this way.
Here are some pics of Martinez training:




In this pic you can see three different wrapping styles: without the thumb (Martinez), normal (right), and double wrapped (left):



I was considering trying this bare thumb style. Mainly because it would give me a little extra length to wrap around my hand and my wrist.

What do you guys think? Would this be smart to do? And, is there any reason Martinez wraps his hands this way?

[bubkusjones]

It's all preference. Try each way and see what works best for you.




Edit:: Upon further inspection, Martinez kind of looks like one of the Nogueira brothers in some of the pics.

[Blair Dennett]

Originally Posted by gauzyhanz

What do you guys think? Would this be smart to do? And, is there any reason Martinez wraps his hands this way?

As bubkus said above me, it's mostly just preference.

One reason you might choose to wrap your hands this way is to allow your thumb a bit more mobility so you can practice keeping your hands open and relaxed between exchanges so you don't tire out as fast from always clenching your fists.

Sort of the opposite principle of tying a shoelace between your feet to make a habit of not overextending your steps.

I doubt Sergio is doing it for that sort of reason though.

Originally Posted by gauzyhanz

I was considering trying this bare thumb style. Mainly because it would give me a little extra length to wrap around my hand and my wrist.

If you are having issues with your knuckles or your wrists using the thumbless wrap to give you a little more protection probably wont fix the issue.

Perhaps you need to evaluate your hand/wrist strength or more than likely, your punching technique.

If it's a short term conditioning weakness, using knuckles guards periodically may help as well.

Perhaps even consider lace-up gloves as well.

Just my .02

[jtmb]

I used to wrap my hands with a "normal" style (wrapping the thumb as well), but I started to notice that it made it harder to make a more natural fist with my thumb wrapping underneath my fingers rather than beside them. It might have also been due to the gloves I was using, but I seemed to make impact with my thumb a lot. I stopped wrapping my thumb, and wouldn't you know, my thumb stayed tighter to my fist and thumb sprains occurred far less frequently (if ever) since the change.

[Markovich]

looks like the same way I wrap my hands.

[gauzyhanz]

For one I didn't want to try this wrap style out because I was having hand or wrist issues. I just simply thought if one didnt need to wrap their thumbs then the wraps could be used more efficiently for parts of the hand that needed protection. Also, I simply found it interesting that a world class pro like Sergio would wrap up this way.

Anyways, I tried this method out. I didn't feel any noticable change in protection. Either with the extra wraps I got around my hand or the lack of protection around my thumb. The only noticable difference was it was more comfortable. I don't know, not really a big deal at all I'm just a detailed oriented guy.