when you become a better boxer/striker, do you actually see punches coming?

[McGangsta]

do incoming punches look slower? so you can dodge them?

 

[fluffball]

Um no, it's not the Matrix. You just get used to the telegraphs, patterns, and know how to respond quickly. When you get good a playing piano you don't see the keys more clearly.

Edit: I guess in hindsight it could feel like they're coming more slowly if someone is a really bad puncher. But the guys that punch well always punch well. The terrible puncher feels slow because you see it coming from soooo far away and know what to do well before it gets there.

 

[McGangsta]

Um no, it's not the Matrix. You just get used to the telegraphs, patterns, and know how to respond quickly. When you get good a playing piano you don't see the keys more clearly.

Edit: I guess in hindsight it could feel like they're coming more slowly if someone is a really bad puncher. But the guys that punch well always punch well. The terrible puncher feels slow because you see it coming from soooo far away and know what to do well before it gets there.

interesting, I'm doing some basic boxing drills. Just wondering how the advanced evasive techniques actually work

 

[Sinister]

Yes. You learn every sign someone is going to punch, you learn to read patterns more quickly, and if you have a trainer who teaches you to manage distance, space = time. More space = more time. In other words when you can find critical distance, you have ample time to see punches coming.

 

[fluffball]

Yes. You learn every sign someone is going to punch, you learn to read patterns more quickly, and if you have a trainer who teaches you to manage distance, space = time. More space = more time. In other words when you can find critical distance, you have ample time to see punches coming.

Bad semantics. The punches are coming at the same speed and always look the same speed, you just have advanced warning from a number of sources. You're just playing into those old martial arts myths by saying "punches look slower now that I've studied at the temple."

Same punches, you just react faster. You literally react faster, unlike the silly "feelings" thing.

 

[Sinister]

You sound a little huffy because what I'm saying contradicts what you're saying. But the problem is you're seeming to focus on small details. Small details are just that, small details. Seeing punches coming better is more of a big picture. There's a reason experienced fighters will say that when they get much better, everything seems slowed down to them. It's those small details paired with management of Distance.

You can try to convolute it all you want, but when you're very skilled, punches appear slower to you and it's not JUST telegraphing. Equally experienced fighters aren't going to do a lot of that.

Also, the statement that punches are ALWAYS coming at the same speed is a little absurd. That insinuates that people don't get faster or better at delivering their shots.

 

[fluffball]

I am huffy, but not because you contradicted what I said, but because I vehemently disagree with the implications. There is no need for you to turn this into something personal.

It may seem utterly insignificant, but the idea of getting better at doing something is so much more in line with striking arts than the idea of seeing things faster. One is reasonable and lends itself to goal-setting, one is just magic. Your view smells of chi and badly speaking in a language you don't understand.

So I stand by my huffiness, you're 100% wrong here.

Edit: Look at it from a new boxer's perspective (what we have in this thread apparently.) If the coach tells him "you can see punches faster after you train here for a while" that's completely useless. If the coach tells him, we're going to get you used to reacting to punches and looking for telegraphs" now all the sudden the guy has a goal and something to learn.

 

[Samuel Reynoso]

No one is talking about time actually slowing so you can count the hairs on a guys knuckles. Perception of time is defiantly affected by your level of training.

Time doesn't always feel like it moves at the same rate and how things feel is way more important than actual miles per hour. Ignoring perception just makes it easy for your perception to be manipulated. That's why magic tricks work and work best on people who think they won't to be tricked.

 

[Sinister]

I am huffy, but not because you contradicted what I said, but because I vehemently disagree with the implications. There is no need for you to turn this into something personal.

It may seem utterly insignificant, but the idea of getting better at doing something is so much more in line with striking arts than the idea of seeing things faster. One is reasonable and lends itself to goal-setting, one is just magic. Your view smells of chi and badly speaking in a language you don't understand.

So I stand by my huffiness, you're 100% wrong here.

Edit: Look at it from a new boxer's perspective (what we have in this thread apparently.) If the coach tells him "you can see punches faster after you train here for a while" that's completely useless. If the coach tells him, we're going to get you used to reacting to punches and looking for telegraphs" now all the sudden the guy has a goal and something to learn.

No. You're using a strawman argument. I didn't imply anything like chi at all, and the reason you're not outright saying I referred to that is because I didn't. I understand my language just fine, but I don't think you do. You can feel I'm 100% wrong all you like, my viewpoint comes from experience. It's not a "belief" that I subscribe to, it's the result of evaluation.

There's no magical element to what I said at all, I gave perfectly reasonable explanations for the PERCEPTION of action seeming slower when you are well-educated on positioning, control of distance, and the things you listed. Note that I didn't refute your notions, just that they are ALL that is happening, they're not.

I think your personal bias is interrupting a bigger notion here. It doesn't matter what a trainer says to a new boxer if the trainer's teaching accomplishes the goal. And as Samuel points out, there's a little thing called relativity. Think about how quickly or slowly a few minutes SEEMS to go in different situations. The last 5 minutes before school lets out seems like an eternity, especially if you're watching the clock, anticipating. The last 5 minutes before school starts seems to go by in 2 Minutes. A slow day at work can seem like forever, a busy day goes quickly. They're all the same time frames, but our perception of them is different. That's a proven theory and to think it doesn't apply to fighting is just wrong.

 

[aries]

You are better able to read the 'tells' that a punch is coming sooner which makes it seem like your reflexes are better when really its mostly due to having more time to react. That's why not telegraphing your shots is so important from an offensive perspective.

Some science about punching speed vs. reaction speed. It takes a fast human 100ms to react (that's the limit for false starts in the 100m) but a punch takes just 100ms from initiation to landing on target. As you can see it's almost impossible to react faster than a punch so boxers must be reacting to a cue which comes before the punch is thrown.

 

[Sinister]

So what do you do with a guy who has little to no tells? Or a single punch with no telegraph and enough power to knock you out?

There's typically two responses. One is you just put up a guard and hope he's dumb enough to hit your gloves over and over. Second is you change positions (either by using your feet, or any other means of changing the range or angle). When you change positions, what you're enacting is a combination of altering the preferred target, AND the preferred distance. Once HIS sense of either is disrupted, you buy yourself time. He's either throwing from slightly too far away, or at a greater angle than needed. He misses, you can counter.

You standing there and keep trying to look for tells that aren't there is a good way to get beat up.

 

[n.diazismylife1999]

You are better able to read the 'tells' that a punch is coming sooner which makes it seem like your reflexes are better when really its mostly due to having more time to react. That's why not telegraphing your shots is so important from an offensive perspective.

Some science about punching speed vs. reaction speed. It takes a fast human 100ms to react (that's the limit for false starts in the 100m) but a punch takes just 100ms from initiation to landing on target. As you can see it's almost impossible to react faster than a punch so boxers must be reacting to a cue which comes before the punch is thrown.

Where are you getting "a punch takes just 100ms from initiation to landing on target"? Most punches take far longer than that. 100ms is a VERY small period of time.

 

[fluffball]

You standing there and keep trying to look for tells that aren't there is a good way to get beat up.

And making someone miss because you have solid fundamentals is not "feeling like the punches are coming slower". Experience makes punches miss, but they're still coming just as fast and they still "feel" like they're coming fast and they still look like a blur.

If you fight a fast guy, you're not going to see half the punches in time no matter what you do.There is no "bullet time" perception. Even Berto landed something like 15% of his punches on Mayweather (which is out of context obviously but you get the idea.)

 

[freaky]

do incoming punches look slower? so you can dodge them?

You just learn to see tell-tale signs. The slightest movements are a giveaway. But that's also a bad thing cuz against advanced students/boxers I get tricked a lot. Against newbies, I'm untouchable since I see the punch before they even do it.

Sometimes, you don't see it but you sense it or whatever and just move or block the punches. Afterwards, you're like why did I move? Once you start thinking about why you're moving, you start to get hit lol. So I try not to think and just let my body go on auto mode. But that's also when I can get tricked a lot by feints. If I start thinking about feints and stuff I'm not fast enough to react to the punches. It's a dilemma. But I'm still a newb.

 

[Sinister]

And making someone miss because you have solid fundamentals is not "feeling like the punches are coming slower". Experience makes punches miss, but they're still coming just as fast and they still "feel" like they're coming fast and they still look like a blur.

If you fight a fast guy, you're not going to see half the punches in time no matter what you do.There is no "bullet time" perception. Even Berto landed something like 15% of his punches on Mayweather (which is out of context obviously but you get the idea.)

If your first statement were true, then everything major league baseball batters learn about hitting baseballs would be defunct, and it would be nearly impossible to hit certain pitches unless they relied solely on the pitcher's wind-up. From the moment of release, they'd have no idea if they were ever going to connect or not if every 90+mph ball "looked like a blur."

In fact, being able to throw punches that always look like blurs sounds like some hokey matrix shit to me:

 

[Art of War]

You get good at a few things which helps you predict punches, which allows you to relax, which makes the whole thing seem slower.

You get better at reading your opponent's weight distribution, which lets you know what attacks they are set up for. You get better at feeling what openings you have available, which lets you better predict where your opponent might attack. You get better at reading the opponent, which allows you to read their habits. And lastly, you train your reflexes from chaotic, to fine tuned.

 

[aerius]

When I was a beginner I'd get punched in the face and have absolutely no idea what hit me. All I'd know was that my nose hurt so obviously I must've been hit, but I might as well have had a blindfold on since I saw nothing. Never saw it coming, never saw it hit me, nothing at all. After more training I could see some of the punches right before I got hit so I wasn't completely in the dark anymore, it was too late to stop anything but at least I knew what I was getting hit with so that I could try to adjust and do something about it. And with more training I started picking up on more punches from earlier on along with recognizing some basic patterns, I had some success seeing things in time to actually do something other than go "oh crap, I'm about to get hit".

Overall, I'd say that with more experience & skill, you not only see more things from earlier on, they also don't seem to come at you as fast.

 

[fightingrabbit]

You develop a spidey sense. If you don't think so then you don't know shit about Boxing.

 

[thugpoet]

Put your hand on a hot stove for five secs, those five secs will be an eternity...

Sit down and play your favourite video game, time will fly...

A sec is a sec but how you perceive that sec is very real.

When you get better, things do " slow down".

 

[Brendon Katz]

Speed = Time/Distance. So an object moving at a certain speed will arrive sooner over a shorter distance than over a longer distance. That's self-evident right? So by using distancing and angling to move further away from the shoulders (and thus forcing the arm and hand to travel over a longer distance) you've effectively given yourself more time before your opponent's punch arrives at it's target. Or to put the last statement another way, you've effectively made your opponent's punch take longer to arrive, therefore making it slower.

Additionally, time perception is just that, perception. Perception is always subjective. There is a theory with some evidence that the perception of time (how long a second takes) varies from person to person and situation to situation, and that gives rise to a theory about why some athlete's develop superhuman reflex speeds.

And from personal experience, I can tell you that strikes do absolutely get slower as your mind speeds up.