Hooks are Straight Punches, not Swings

Thankyou Ramsay,I’ve been doing swings not hooks all my martial life,no one has ever explained why I’ve been missing the target 70% of the time. Your demo has opened my eyes at last,great work!👏👏

"Improvement is not a destination. It's a way of life." I love it. Thanks for the video, Ramsey!

I've been trying to understand hook mechanics for like a year now. This vid is perfect. Thank you!

A swing punch is commonly called a "haymaker" here in Canada, and is the most common punch in drunk street fighting. Thanks for the video coach Ramsey.

I didn't expect a wholesome scene with Ramsey swinging with his daughter when I clicked on this video.

You're absolutely right. I love throwing hooks when i do bagwork and when I first started learning to throw hooks, i threw it in a swinging motion and every time it lands it feels powerless, awkward and it sometimes hurts me, my shoulders and wrists specifically. Then i came across your video about resistance bands and how punching is more about pulling than pushing. I applied what I made out of that video and started to imagine myself pulling something with my rear hand and at the same time rotate my body along with my lead hand, clockwise. I was surprised to how it felt so right. I just kept practicing my hooks that way by keeping my hand in a straight trajectory and only using the weight of my body to propel the punch sideways rather than swinging it.

I respectfully disagree, this is just one way of hooking. Assuming you learn how to punch properly you will hook correctly. Swinging hooks do work and do get points in boxing. There is a purpose to everything. Just like a jab isn’t meant to knock out someone, a quick swinging hook is the same. Like a slap. If you punch completely straight at any angle… it’s s straight punch… not really a hook. I do understand the message though… you want to keep your body behind your punch and not reach outside of your center of gravity when throwing it. It’s better to hook with the whole body and not just your arm.

As someone who has tried forever to teach this very lesson to his students, I liked this video based on the title alone.

Excellent! It took me years to throw a decent hook and it was thanks to many pieces of advice I received from people trying to help me become better. But now I understand the "first the uppercut, then the hook". Thank you so much 🙏

Cool video Ramsey. This is a textbook old school hook. Glad you pointed out the difference from a swing. A propper hook is a highly technical punch. A swing can indeed work as well. But it not as technical complicated as a hook. That being said, there are some variations and hybrid between hooks and swings. Not all hooks are "straight"

The elite boxers do hooks with a straight palm-down motion or a looping palm-in motion. These are different punches and some boxers prefer one method to the other. Some boxers will switch between the 2 methods because the palm down can sneak over the guard while the palm in can sneak behind the guard. The Russians even prefer the palm-out method. That's not my preference but it works for Fedor. The palm-down method is almost like a wide hard jab coming from the outside and it has the benefit of a longer range. The palm-in method can also be relatively long range but you can't fully lock out because you'll hyperextend your arms on impact. There are elite boxers that swear palm-in is the right way while other elite boxers swear palm-down is correct and the other is wrong. But there are no right ways to do hooks; just different ways with pros and cons. My preferred method is palm-in but I will sometimes use palm-down to attack from a different angle. Here's me palm-in with bare hands and no wraps going full out on a hard heavy bag. https://www.instagram.com/p/CZRsJmBIhNX/

Well i'll be... I'm a boxing coach, and i been watching your videos a fair bit recently and they'll be "recomended homework" from here on out, you explain what i teach far better than i ever could

Ramsey is a voice you can trust --Excellent professional top notch advice Thank you for sharing

I like the way you explain things. As someone who has taken wing Chun, boxing, and muay thai, I know exactly what you are talking about. I always watched my coach throw his hook almost straight and could never figure out how he did it. Hearing it explained in a different way was really helpful. Thank you sir!

This was really eye opening. I'm not the most experienced with martial arts, but I always had a punching bag that I would practice learning how to punch. Always hurt my left shoulder trying to throw hooks! Now I understand the mechanics but I need to start retraining my habits. Thank you

Thank you for this valuable and practical guidance. I have been struggling with these techniques and was too ignorant to know why.

The hottest hook in combat sports at the moment, Alex Pereira's left hook most certainly is a swing. If you study his body mechanics, you can see that he mostly stands in an almost bladed stance with his elbow pulled back having his fist almost behind his shoulder line, then his fist travels in a circular(!) motion ending in front of the right side of his chest, during that motion, he connects with the head of his opponent. Also check the famous photo of Ali avoiding Frazier's left hook which quite obviously wasn't thrown as a straight. (Not saying Ramsey's hook is wrong, but it's certainly not the only way to throw a hook)

This video made me realize the uppercut punch is essentially a vertical trajectory hook punch!!!

Fantastico coach! Whenever I teach boxing I say " believe it or not, your most important weapon are your feet " glad to see Im not the only one 🤜😁🤛 the fight is everything! The way is in training. ⚔️

Thanks Coach. I go back and forth on hook technique, there's more than one way of doing them, but some forms are more efficient and effective than others. Cheers.