Description
Fighting techniques and strategies from World Champion and Hall of Fame Boxer, Jack Dempsey.
Jack Dempsey, one of the greatest and most popular boxers of all time, reveals the techniques behind his unparalleled success in the ring. Straightforward and with detailed illustrations, Championship Fighting instructs the reader in the theory, training, and application of powerful punching, aggressive defense, proper stance, feinting, and footwork. The boxing methods Dempsey reveals will prove useful to both amateurs and professionals or anyone interested in teaching themselves how to box or practice martial arts.
“I was confident that I could take the rawest beginner, or even an experienced fighter, and teach him exactly what self-defense was all about.” —Jack Dempsey
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CB Musgrove –
I box a little and came across quite a few wonderful reviews of “Championship Fighting” on Amazon and decided to pick it up. I am writing this review about 6 months after I finished, as I am now reading Roger Kahn’s biography of Jack Dempsey and was astonished to find it quoted almost word for word in that book by Dempsey himself.
What this book is is a summation of Dempsey (with the help of Jack Cuddy) and his views on the art of boxing. Dempsey was not an educated man, but he was a fanatical student of boxing and, if this book is any indication, a bit of a natural writer. He learned his art in mining towns of the early 20th century and was extremely dismissive of the training ideas of those who came immediately after him, though he feels he shares some of the blame for bringing amateurs into the fight game because of the huge crowds he drew during his fights of the twenties. He spent a long time writing this book, which started out as more of a journal of his time learning his craft.
Dempsey spends the first half of the book explaining punches, since that is the area that he thinks was the least understood in his time and one that a boxer needs to master before they begin to learn defense. What I can say is that Dempsey’s techniques work: he talks about the power line and when you use it, you can feel a difference. His discussion of pure and impure punches is very interesting. Probably the best known part of this book is his discussion of the “Falling Step”. What I can say about that is that it does work, but you are better off watching a YouTube video about it, because the books diagrams aren’t the clearest (Here is a good one, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cqieQ…)
However, once you get past the punches, the defensive part of the book is just as interesting. Dempsey not only explains the differences between stances but goes into quite a bit of time on slips and his particular style, the bob and weave. I actually prefer Dempsey’s explanation of slipping more than my trainers- we have had discussions about this- and I laughed when I saw a YouTube video of George Foreman in his prime doing the “Dempsey” bob, which my trainers also don’t like very much. Dempsey is also a master at explaining counterpunch sequences. Dempsey’s explanation of what an actual right cross is and how it is a devastating punch if used properly, is wonderful and will make you cluck your tongue at those who toss the term “right cross” around at any right handed punch.
Probably the nicest part for me was the writing style; I am still not sure if Dempsey used a ghost, but if he did, it was a great one, because it sounds exactly like you’d expect Dempsey to sound. Read this and then read Roger Kahn’s biography- a good read, but like others, I suspect he liked Dempsey too much as a person for it to be a good biography. Then, appetite whetted, go forth and read both of Joe Libeling’s fantastic boxing books, “The Sweet Science” and “A Neutral Corner”. Who would have thought that in my late 40’s I would end up with two dead boxers, Jack Dempsey and Archie “The Old Mongoose” Moore, as new sports idols?
Samantha –
I love this book!
petitchinois –
I chanced my bucks with this book and turns out that it is not a disappointing investment.
There’s plenty of useful information in this book that you can put into actual practice in your training regimen which makes it even more appealing to me. This is more like an “instructional manual” and the book was obviously designed for that purpose. You can’t go wrong with Jack Dempsy’s work.
PS I saw one of the review which said perhaps this is where Bruce Lee draw his inspiration. I totally agree with that. I’ve trained a little Jeet kune do in the past and Jeet kune do is the south paw version of Jack Dempsy’s approach to boxing. Now Bruce Lee was learning to box as part of his martial art development. It makes me think that perhaps his boxing coach were familiar with Jack’s method or one of those old timers boxers/ maybe Bruce Lee even read this book before. There’s just so much resemblance to dismiss the possibility that Bruce Lee based his martial art on Jack’s boxing approach. To call it a coincidence I think would not be a satisfying answer. There’s 99 percent overlap between the two except the kungfu elements of parrying and kicking were part of jeet kune do’s arsenal which present the 1 percent.
PSS Another comment were saying it was difficult managing the “fall-step”. Where I found it interesting was that if you had been a runner like me who studied the “Pose Method running” – by Dr. Nicolas Romanov ~ you grasp the idea almost instantly. I have no problem to adopt the “falling-step” in my training routine because the idea of falling step was what constitute the main practice of Pose Method of running. If you don’t know what is “Pose Method Running” maybe you should google it and I highly recommend the book. It has completely changed the way I run and anyone can run injury free. Ok sounds like I am reviewing for another book but just so that you know another good investment and running is also part of boxing conditioning so there you go. ( It is surprising how much you can learn from books given the time and patience!)
Kevin –
Nécessaire à tous boxeurs
SK –
This book is good. He really doesn’t include anything in it that you can’t test. It will instantly make you smarter about fighting as far as punching is concerned and not getting punched too. He talks a great deal about boxing vs fighting. It’s legit.
S. Cranow –
Jack Dempsey is one of boxings all time greats. He wrote a book on boxing. The main focus of the book is on punching. This is what he starts off with before teaching the beginner anything else. Punching is the most important element in a fight. All too sad is that not enough trainers teach their students how to punch.
The most important part of a punch is to put your body weight behind so you hit with more force. The falling step has you step forward with your left foot and launch your jab a the same time. The line of power extends in a line all the way to you’s bottom two knuckles. There are several types of punches in boxing. There’s jabs, shovel, upper cuts and hooks. He explains step by step how to launch those punches along with good illustration on how to launch those punches. There is a section on footwork cause remember footwork is just as crucial to the success of a boxer as is punching.
In boxing there are several ways to defend against a punch. The most effective way is evading . When a punch is coming the boxer somehow moves out of the way. There is ducking , bobbing and weaving and slipping. Most beginner start with blocking. Blocking is done with the hand, forearm and even shoulders. The second most effective defense is parrying or redirecting the punch.
Finally at the end there are exercises to improve your stamina and physical shape. A good easy to read classic on boxing. Coming from a real old fashioned fighter this book is worth it.
Amazon Kunde –
I started boxing more than a year ago now and his Book helped me to improve my Boxing a lot and also taught me many things that weren’t taught in my Boxing gym.
Dempsey explains the techniques very good in my opinion and almost all techniques aged well also and aren’t outdated at all. I only wished he would’ve talked more about footwork tho.
If you look at his fights he may just seem like a brawler who just relies on his strength and aggression but he was actually a technical Genius.
I mean I suck at Boxing and I’m not really physically strong but his book helped me a lot to have more snap in my punches, especially when it comes to the jab or jolt.
I think anyone who does a martial art or martial arts should read this book.
Don –
Very informative and has some good information for boxers
JOSE MAURICIO –
Muy buen libro..vale la pena