Four weeks, eight sessions, eight people, £60 with wraps to keep
Beginners' fundamentals
A four-week course for people who have never boxed: stance, guard, footwork, the six punches, slipping and blocking, and how to work a round, taught in eight evening sessions to a group of eight. At the end you can walk into any class and know what the coach is asking for.
Most people who are nervous of boxing gyms are nervous of not knowing what to do. Fundamentals fixes that in four weeks. It is a small group starting together, at the same level, with Kerry teaching one thing at a time and nobody watching but each other.
Week one is stance, guard, footwork and the jab and cross. Week two adds the hook and uppercut and how to throw them without swinging. Week three is defence: slips, rolls, blocks and stepping off the line, practised on the pads and the slip rope. Week four puts it together in rounds, so the last session is six rounds of real pad work with the bell. Every session finishes with ten minutes of conditioning that gets a little harder each week.
Eight people at most so everyone gets the coach, Monday and Wednesday at 6pm for four weeks. You keep the wraps, and you leave with a card of everything covered, a week of free classes, and a discount on the monthly pass if you stay. Miss a session and you can catch it in the next month's course.
What you get
- Eight sessions over four weeks
- Eight people, one coach, everyone a beginner
- The six punches, footwork and defence
- Wraps to keep and gloves lent
- A week of free classes afterwards
- Missed sessions caught up next month
What it costs
£60 for the four weeks: eight sessions, Monday and Wednesday at 6pm, wraps to keep. A new course starts on the first Monday of each month. The classes page has the timetable, the spaces left and this week's free pad slots.
Questions about fundamentals
Am I too old for this?
The oldest person to finish fundamentals so far was seventy-one. If you can walk briskly for twenty minutes you can do the course; tell us about anything a doctor has said.
What if I miss a week?
Catch the same session in the next month's course, free. The card tells the coach what you have covered.
The first round is free. Twenty minutes on the pads.
Tell us what you are after and roughly when you can train, and we reply within the hour between rounds with a time: how to stand, a wrapped hand, the jab and cross, and an honest answer about where to start. No card details, and nobody hits you.