Damn internet

Ok i know I haven’t posted in a while, it’s cause the internet at the gym has been down and the cafe that I go to use internet is painfully slow. Hopefully internet at the gym will be up and running in a few days, so in the mean time I’ve been entertaining myself with episodes of Family Guy. Stay tuned….

Cost of living in Thailand

I’m still amazed at the cost of living in Thailand. Things are just so unbelievably cheap that I question whether or not there even making a profit. So ill give u a run down of bits and pieces. I’m going off the current exchange rate of $1 AUD = 28 thai baht

1 bottle of water (1.5 lt) – 15 baht (AUD $0.50) Its not evian but water is water
1 meal (small portion of crispy skin pork OR chicken with rice) – 30 baht ( AUD $1.00)
1 meal at western style cafe/restaurant stir fry with rice – 90 baht (AUD $3.20)
1 hot coffee (This was at a more high end western restaurant) – 50 baht (AUD $1.70)
1 bag fruit watermelon or pineapple – 20 baht (AUD $0.70)
1 Chocolate sundae – 25 baht (AUD $0.89)
1 hour thai massage – 150 baht (AUD $5.35)
Repaired my sony ericsson mobile – 450 baht (AUD $16) I paid AUD $150 back at home to repair the same phone only to have it break down again.

The thai prices I have quoted are generally cheaper than that of the other major tourists hubs such as pattaya, or phuket. There’s not many foreigners around where I am staying so most of the prices we pay are the prices that the thais pay, which is fine by me!

Benjamin Button goes to thailand

Has anyone ever seen that movie Benjamin Button, where Brad Pitt plays the character who is born old and grow younger as he ages? For some reason thats what I think about when I see some of the thai kids. There only children yet they’ve been through and experienced so much. I know I’ve mentioned it several times already but I’m going to say it again, damn these thai kids are good. They are so composed and technical in both sparring and fighting. After being here for a little over 2 weeks now I’ve gotten to know the trainers and the kids a little better. Most of the kids have already clocked up 30-40 fights by the time there 13. No wonder there so damn comfortable in the ring. The other night I got to see one of the little ones in action at a local show. The ref stopped the fight in round two after a number of unanswered elbow strikes. The refs really look after the safety of the kids here and will stop the fight early if they see one in trouble. The video below is of a young boy by the name of plug (all the kids have some pretty cool names, not sure if they are nicknames or something they’ve adopted). When he’s not kicking pads or sparring he enjoys playing with fireworks and getting up to mischief with the other kids around the gym. It’s hard to believe that a young boy like this has fought about 30 times and has achieved in muay thai, what many of us can only dream of in the western world.

This is what he gets up to when he’s not kicking peoples asses

Goal setting

I’ve always been one to set myself goals, but usually kept them at the back of my head. But this time I’m going to post them up so I can be 100% honest with whether or not I managed to achieved them. So here they go. I know I should have listed them from the start but better now than never. Goal setting is about being able to measure whether or not you achieved your goals, but a few of them will be difficult to measure as you will understand later on.

1. Quit my job and train in thailand for a few months.
This has actually been a life long goal that I’ve been wanting to do for some years. Just never got around to do it, or kept making excuses why not to do it….eg cant afford it, what if I it’s too hard, blah blah all the same old excuses that stops people from living there lives. I decided to set myself a deadline that I would take the plunge by the end of the year and so here I am.

2. Learn how to fight.
Sure I know how to punch and kick, I even know how to put them together in a combo, but the thais understand fighting on a different level. Its not that they are better fighters because they punch or kick harder, or strike with lightning speed and power. It’s because they know how to read people, they understand how to read a fight. They know that if an opponent is charging forward with a barrage of punches that the majority of his weight is on his front leg which leaves him open to leg chops or front leg trips and sweeps. They understand balance. I know it will be difficult to gain a complete understanding in the time I have, but I will absorb and try understand as much of it as I can.

3. Have a fight in thailand.
Fights are easy to come by, its just the fact of not knowing who your up against, or having familiar faces in your corner thats the daunting part.

4. Give it 100%
This ones will be hard to measure. At the end of the trip I want to be able to look back and say to myself that I truly gave it my all.

Some training videos

Grappling Sparring with Bao and I.


Padwork with the Thais

Kids doing padwork
I may have mentioned this before, but I’m going to say it again….these kids train damn hard.

Fight night in Hua Hin

This was the first fight night I went to since I’ve been here. It was a pretty small show put on in a gym in Hua Hin. The area itself seemed alot more “touristy” with the number of foreigners I spotted, and the markets catered to foreigners looking for some cheap memorabilia. Our gym had 2 young thai boys, and one sweedish foreigner on the show. On first impressions the place seemed like a seedy bar fight night, with tables around the ring reserved for fat english tourists looking to watch some “Moo Thai” and drink some Chang beer. Change rooms were simply just mats put on the floor around the entrance, everyone warmed up and changed together. I always find it a bit off putting when I see my opponent before a fight, I think it would be worse in this case if I had to change and warm up next to him…. I’d better do some push ups and sit ups before i stripped down to my jocks haha. The thai boys didn’t seem to mind at all. They seemed to be composed and unphased with the whole fact that they were about to fight. I guess that they had done it so many times that they didn’t care about the pre-fight fan fare that westerners usually experience. One thing that really bothered me about the fight show was that there was no weigh in. Fighters were matched based roughly on similiar weights and experience based on what the individual gyms had told the promoters.

Both the thai boys fighting from the gym were both very young but had, had about 40-50 fights each! The youngest one would have been about 14 and the older one was maybe 16-17. It was amazing to see how composed and technical they were during the fight. At no stage did the fight get sloppy…. they fought with superior technique all the way through. Amazing for 5 x 5 minute rounds. The sweedish lad from the gym had a rough night in the office as the thai he fought came out very aggressive and swinging for the fences. The thai wasn’t a technical fighter, but just started swinging his arms like clubs. Unfortunately the out lad got caught and the ref ended the fight.

One of the fights that stood out in my mind was one of the typical ones we hear of, a westerner VS a thai, and the thai taking a dive in 30 secs. I got to witness this for the first time last night and felt a bit of unease. It was obvious from the start that this was a bit of a mismatch and more of a pay day for the thai. From memory the fight started and ended with a jab jab clinch knee, GAME OVER. The thai boy went down and stayed down to what I saw as a pretty dodgy shot. I guess its a win win situation, because the thai boys gets a couple of hundred baht for 20 seconds of work and the westerner gets some cool photos of him knocking out a thai to post up on his facebook… Its just wrong. The westerner was actually supposed to fight another english lad from our gym but it didn’t happen because the fight was on short notice, so the thai must have decided to jump in. I guarantee you that the english lad from our gym would have given him a hell of a fight if they did get it on.

At the end of the day we need to look deep within ourselves and question why we are fighting. It’s not an easy sport, but we all want to drink from the cup of glorious victory, but are u willing to run 10ks at 6am every fkn morning to get to that cup? most people would say no. If you’re fighting for the glory and fan fare thats associated with being a so called “fighter” then you’re in it for the wrong reason. Fighting is about bettering yourself as a person, its about stepping up to the plate and putting everything you’ve ever worked for on the line, for that 25 minutes. Are you willing to take that risk that you could possibly lose, even after training so hard and for so long? Not many are willing to take that risk. To those who have stepped foot in that ring, then my hat goes off to you.

nice poster, too bad all the photos are not of the actual fighters

Where’s the sparring?

One of the most interesting observations I’ve made is that there seems to be a lack or even non existent amount of thai sparring? The only real padded sparring we seem to do is boxing sparring. It seems a bit odd that these kids can fight at the level they compete at with so little sparring. So to kill my curiosity I asked around some of the other foreigners at the gym. The way that they see it is that most of these kids fight so frequently that “heavy” sparring isn’t necessary. Makes sense actually. Why would u risk a corked thigh or corked shin knowing that you’ll be fighting in a few weeks time. Also most of these kids fight for a living; they make money through fighting. They cant afford to be out injured for weeks because of some stupid little sparring injury.

The type of sparring that they do here is light and CONTROLLED. I place a bold the word controlled because the thais actually understand what it means to be controlled. Im sure most of you would have experienced some “controlled” sparring back at home that has escalated into an epic title fight. There’s no ego here. Hit them with a good shot and they’ll smile and acknowledge it with a nod. Do it back at home and someone will try tear your head off.

Training schedule and some pictures of the gym

I thought ive give a basic rundown to the schedule of the gym as a few people have asked me what the training entails everyday. Nothing special, just some damn hard training.

MORNING SESSION
6:30am 10k run along the river. Its a nice slow pace as most people (including myself) just got out of bed.

- Skipping for 10 minutes
- Shadow boxing
- Bag work. The trainer will usually come around and ask you to focus on a particular technique he wants you to drill on a particular bag.
- The thai kids will usually clinch in the morning aswell
- Sometimes we will do some very light technique sparring
- Session finishes off with 100-200 knees on the bag, 50-100 pullups, 200 situps
Then finally BREAKFAST!

I usually nap during the afternoon as there’s not too much to do around here except for the market and the local 7/11! Sounds exciting doesn’t it!

EVENING SESSION
3:30pm start. Kicks off with a 5 km run.
-10 minutes skipping
- Shadow Boxing
- Boxing Sparring on MON, WEDS, FRI
- Bag work
- Padwork with trainer. Most people get about 4 rounds but more if you are fighting
- Technique sparring
- Clinch sparring (sometimes this lasts for over an hour)
- 200 knees on the bag, 50-100 pull ups, 200 situps

As you can see there’s no secret formula…. it just comes down to training damn hard. Everyday!

the frog who decided to make my shoe its home

my front door

the pokemon that lives at the gym

breakfast is served

Breakfast over the river

more creatures that pass through the gym on a daily basis

fearless

Theres a number of young kids at the gym, ranging from 8-15 years old. Most of these kids live at the gym, so muay thai is there life. They still go to school, and do everything normal kids do but they fight for a living. These kids actually train alot harder than people back home. They do the full 10k morning run and 5 k evening run as well as everything else all the senior fighters do. There’s no complaints and no whinging, they just train. Occasionally we get the opportunity to do some technique sparring with them. Obviously I out weigh them by 2 or 3 times but they seem unphased by this. The way they spar, the look in there eyes, they are fearless.

It was pouring down rain this morning so instead of the run we did a 20 minute non stop skip. I think I prefer the run to be honest! I actually didn’t feel too shabby at training today. Its probably because I’m getting a better nights sleep and starting to finally readjust to the time difference and humidity.

First impressions

The gym itself is just outside of Bangkok. Its about 20 minutes from the airport and away from the city nightlife and high rises that populate Bangkok. The gym itself is right along the river surrounded by a number or residental houses. It has a large matted area with several bags, and a elevated ring where most of the sparring and padwork takes place. So pretty much your typical thai style gym. The beauty about this place is that its away from city nightlife but not so far out that you’re totally isolated from civiliasation. Its actually about 5 minutes from the market and a small strip of restaurants and shops. The other great thing about this gym being in a “non tourist” area is that everything is damn cheap! U can get meals for around 30 baht, which is fantastic for anyone on a budget.

The morning session kicked off with a 10km run along the river. Nice and slow pace, but still struggled as Im still adjusting to the heat and humidity. By the time we got back to the gym most of the trainers were still in bed because they had a late night out because a number of the young kids had fought. Oh well that was good news for me, I wanted to ease my way into training. Especially after the gruelling line up my wrestling coach Chris Shen put me through on Saturday. For those of you who don’t know what a line up is, its when u get to wrestle EVERYBODY at your gym. It went for about 15 x 2 min rounds. I think I was about to go into cardiac arrest towards the end.

After a short trip to the market, i found myself napping for the rest of the day. It was difficult getting some quality sleep in this humidity, and I’m guessing it will take me a few days to adjust. The night session started off with a shorter 5km run, still at a nice slow pace. This time all the kids and fighters from the gym ran with us. There was about 10 young kids, 4 teenagers, and 3 other foreigners. After the run we did about 15 minutes of skipping and then straight into some sparring. Got to move around with a few of the guys. The interesting thing was that they made us all spar in 20 ounce gloves! I suppose they were looking after us. After boxing sparring is when the fun started, did 3 x 5 minute rounds on pads and felt pretty stuffed. Its amazing how the humidity can take a drastic effect on your fitness. The rest of the night then ended with some very light technique sparring, clinch sparring, then the usual knees and kicks on the bag. All in all was a pretty tough “welcome to thailand” day. Will post up some photos soon.