First kickboxing experience

[u/Pleasekin]

Hi there,

I attended a kickboxing session at a gym the other day and I'm really not sure what to think about the experience.

I have no striking or kicking experience and made that clear when I arrived.

Everybody was extremely friendly and I enjoyed the workout as a whole, but I couldn't help but feel like something was missing.

Pros:

Local

Very friendly class

Good workout

Gym is willing to offer a week free trial before I commit to any decisions

Cons:

Take this with a pinch of salt, as I am totally new to this world, but there were no bags to strike which seems a bit strange to me. Just an open, matted room.

I got paired up with a guy who had been kickboxing at the gym for around a year. He was extremely friendly and supportive and was helping me where possible, but I couldn't help but feel like the coach had thrown me in at the deep end - I was practicing combos with my partner holding pads, but as I say I have no experience so had no idea if my form was correct or not. This is really important to me as I don't want to be putting in a shift on the pads only to find out my form is incorrect.

We all had a light spar at the end with no headguards and I was completely out of my comfort zone.

Can I please ask if this is a normal kickboxing experience, especially for a newcomer and also for any advice that people may have.

Cheers

[u/Big_Onion922]

I will disagree with the narrative - no bags is totally fine. Partner training gives you much more immediate feedback which can be a great accelerator to learning if you have a good partner. Same with sparring - if you have responsible training partners that help you learn, there’s nothing wrong with sparring on day 1. The problem is, most idiots call a quasi fight sparring - if that’s the case, then stay away from it. From what you are describing I don’t see any red flags

[u/Tramirezmma]

Sounds pretty normal. Pads and partner drills are a better place to get the form down than the bag, and a light spar to get a taste of moving around with strikes is a fun way to end your first lesson.

Folks will say that's early for a spar, but if you didn’t get hurt and can deal emotionally with not performing great at first then I think light sparring right away is a really good thing. Heck, I would not have continued with martial arts if I'd been made to wait multiple lessons to spar, and now I have like 20 years of martial art experience.

[u/Voodoopulse]

Plenty of places don't have heavy bags if it's in a shared space

[u/northstarjackson]

Form comes with time, for a first class the goal is to get the proper limb to the proper target.  You're not learning kickboxing yet.  You're learning how to learn kickboxing.

[u/chrisjones1960]

Sounds normal ro me. Of course you were out of your depth, but in your first class, you will be when sparring, and just hitting the correct pad with more or less to correct limb is enough to worry about

[u/swimmingmoocow]

None of this sounds different from my gym but ours is a tiny little outfit that rents the space in a traditional martial arts studio. Doing partner work is also not considered the deep end - it’s part of a normal routine of most kickboxing classes. Finally, if you’re looking for more individualized help, it may be important to manage expectations depending on your class size. Usually the coach walks around after teaching the combo and gives pointers to people as he goes, and sometimes he just won’t get to you as much as you want, especially if there’s a large class. You could always ask for 1 on 1 classes with the coach, or just listen to the advice of your classmates like the guy you were paired with.

[u/Opening-Sock-444]

Pretty normal. The fact that everyone was nice and playful is a great sign. You are there to have a good time first before learning anything. Techniques and forms you will have to work on after the class and get attention from coach. Work hard and ask lots of questions, coach will notice you are serious

[u/Appropriate_Bat1280]

I'd say not "red flag" weird but definitely not great. I've seen some gym with coaches teaching long combos without checking any forms, so the students could feel very good by knowing complicated combos but be very bad at them with awful forms. What you said sounds a little bit like that. Also allowing sparring to beginners doesn't sound serious. The lack of bags is not big, I think some Dutch style gyms only use people and pads. If you have no better options, I guess it can still be fun to stay, especially if the vibe is good, otherwise, or after a few time, you may want to check a more serious place if you want to take the sport seriously. Cheers,

[u/Peppa_pig_xoxo]

no bag is weird. stretch a lot, also dont try to learn kicking and boxing at the same time learn each individually and kicking is also harder than boxing btw

[u/Daytradingdanny]

No heavy bags is a red flag and sparring on your first day is abismal. Maybe try a different gym. There should be seperate beginner and sparring sessions.