Rumble Boxing – Dupont Circle

Unless you live under a rock, you’ve probably heard of Rumble DC and it’s long-awaited and highly anticipated journey to DC. They’ve been teasing us with their Dupont Circle façade on M Street for over a year now, but rejoice because they are FINALLY here and boy were they worth the wait! This is the most premiere boxing class we’ve ever taken and we can’t remember being so impressed and enamored by a studio opening since Barry’s first got here. Everything from the décor to the music to the lights was a 10/10 experience and you need to run, not walk, yourselves down here to see it for yourself!

RUNDOWN

WORKOUT

The studio is divided into two sections, the bag side and the floor side. When you sign up for class online, you’ll pick a spot to start with a number and that correlates to both your bag and your bench. Class opens with a 5-minute overview of the 6 punches that you’ll be using in class – jabs (nicknamed ‘1’ for the left arm and ‘2’ for the right arm); hooks (3 and 4, respectively) and uppercuts (5 and 6) with some dynamic warm ups running through different combos. We started on the floor but our instructor led everyone through a warmup together, after the punching overview, that included lots of cardio movements for 3 minutes: jumping jacks, squat jumps, butt kicks, cherry pickers, mountain climbers, rinse and repeat. After our warmup, we had 3 separate rounds of 3 minutes of conditioning, for a total of 6 minutes of work, to complete at the floor section. The first round use dumbbells for 6x front squats, 6x overhead presses, and 6x lunge jumps repeated over the course of the 3 minutes. Our second round included 8x tricep kickbacks, 8x bicep curls and 16x bicycles on our benches for 3 minutes. Our last round of this section had us completing 30 seconds of reverse lunges, back rows, and squat jumps for 30 seconds each for the 3 minutes. Every round included a mixture of lower and upper body with some abs mixed in; so come prepared to get a full body beatdown. We headed over to the bags after and followed the same 3 rounds of 3 minutes. Each round included a variety of different punching combos that followed the overview we received at the beginning of class and if you forgot what the numbers were or how they looked, fear not, they were demonstrated continuously at screens at the front of the class. We headed back to the floor after for 2 rounds of 3 minutes, totaling anothr 6 minutes of work. The first round was super cardio focused and used super light hand weights (shaped like “brass knuckles”) to do a boxer’s punch (super fast jabbing motions standing still), cherry pickers, and mountain climbers for 30 seconds each during the 3 minute timeframe. Our last floor round was ab focused, using the brass knuckles, and included 10x boxer sit up on the bench, 10x toe touches, and 10x Russian twists. We dug deep for that final 6 minutes on the bags, but the combos included a ton of variety between being “speed” focused (jabbing the bag using 1-2 punches as fast and light as possible) and “power” focused (with the goal of packing a HARD punch) to mix things up. We finished with 3 minutes of stretching, mostly our arms, shoulders and back which was OH so needed from all that upper body work!

INSTRUCTOR

Andrew S is a Master Rumble Trainer tasked with moving to a new city each time a location opens up there and training all of the new instructors and you can tell this isn’t his first rodeo. He brought the motivation and the energy that we’d expect from a brand new workout class coming to town. Rumble has a built in stage with a computer set up at the front of each room for the instructor, and Andrew’s role in class was essentially a motivational DJ. He demonstrated every move, both for the bags and floor side, but each side has screens up at the front with a video of an instructor demonstrating every move and the moves written out for reference. Andrew helped yell out time checks for every round which was clutch because there is no countdown clock anywhere. He circulated throughout class a few times on each round to correct form on the bags or yell out some motivational words of encouragement but don’t expect too much one on one assistance or adjustment – it’s not the Rumble way.

SPACE

Everything from the entrance to the locker rooms to the actual studio is a completely curated experience and the definition of Instagram-worthy. Rumble’s space and studio design was essentially the Soul Cycle of boxing studios, with a spacious and white foyer where you’ll check in, rent gloves ($3) and buy wraps ($8 and yours to keep) if you need to. There was plenty of badass branded merchandise to purchase as well, from tops to crops, and an epic mural of Notorious B.I.G. and Ruth Beta Ginsburg that was THE spot to grab your ‘gram (preferably a Boomerang with your gloves on and jabbing in motion) after class. The actual workout studio was so beautiful and sleek that we don’t think we can box anywhere else ever again. The floor side had individual benches and each bench had weights built into a cut out side of it, ranging from 5 lbs to 20 lbs to grab from. Eliminating that awkward shuffle in between round transitions to grab weights was everything we never knew we needed. The walls were decorated with old school boxing images (think Rocky and Raging Bull) and the room was kept super dark with flashes of bright and sexy lights. Obviously the locker rooms didn’t disappoint either. Not only do they carry Dry Bar hair products and blow dryers in the sleek all-white space, they actually have 2 individual infrared saunas in there as well. The locker rooms alone are enough to have us booking daily morning classes just so we have an excuse to get ready in here on the reg.