Thai Boxing

Yesterday I was able to check something off my bucket list.  It has been something I have always wanted to see in person. With the help of my good friend Nott and my new friend Gap. We were able to go and watch live Muy Thai aka Thai Boxing matches. These matches were no exhibitions. The boxers definitely wanted to win.

One would not label me as a city boy. Being that I did not grow up in a big city, I sometimes do not quite grasp how big some cities can be. In Santa Cruz, one can go from one side of town to another in about 10 minutes with no traffic. Take Bangkok for example. Bangkok is HUGE. When Nott said the arena to watch the fights is across town, I figured, “no big deal, lets take the bus or a cab.” Little did I know the arena is a solid one-hour away. Not only would we be taking a bus, but we would also need to take a river ferry. Which by the way was pretty damn cool. Although the river water was absolutely disgusting and I had some splash in my face, which almost made me want to vomit.

The outside of the arena looked like any other sporting event. With throngs of people outside, and stands selling their goods. Nott and Gap were going to try and get me the local Thai ticket, which only cost 250 Baht, instead of the foreigner ticket, which costs 1,000 baht (the exchange rate is 30 to 1). Needless to say our plot was rooted out fairly quickly. As soon as I got into the locals line a rather aggravated Thai lady walked up to me demanding to know where I was from. In that situation I thought it best not to lie, even if I wanted to lie, it is not like I could have responded to her in Thai. I relented and said I was from America. Upon hearing I was from America, she sternly told me to go into the foreigner’s line. After making sure I went into that line, she walked back to her ratpack and starting talking to her friends about how the stupid American tried to get the Thai price. You may be wondering I would know she was saying that, but trust me, judging from the way she was talking and seeing her friends react, it was pretty easy to figure out what they were saying. Not to mention I heard her say, “American” a couple of times. So moving on I paid the 1,000 baht and we got into the arena.

Walking into the arena, it sort of had that dive bar feel. It was dark, except for the ring was lit. It smelled old; there were no seats, just terraced concrete levels to sit on. It was similar to a school amphitheater. Thank god it was air conditioned though. Without thinking much of it, we got the closest spot we could to the ring and plopped down. Our tickets were for the upper levels, but since the arena was super small, it did not really matter where we sat, because everywhere had a good view.

The first fight started at around 630. I already knew in Thai Boxing that during the fight, traditional music is played. It is a pretty unique sound, if you have never heard it before, just watch a fight and youtube and crank up the volume. It has a thai flute (don’t know what the hell its actually called), a percussion, and two drums. The music isn’t loud, but it just plays along as the fight goes and helps the whole atmosphere. Before every fight the fighters have a pre-fight ritual of stretching and bowing. It is definitely more fashion over function as the fighters do not seem too into it, but they have to do it out of respect and ritual. Upon finishing of the ritual, they go to their corners for a pre-fight prayer with their trainer. Once completed, they meet in the center and the referee starts the fight.

Each fight has five-three minute rounds. The first round is almost always the most boring. The fighters more or less just stand there feeling each other out. Round two gets a little more interesting as the fighters start to get aggressive. By far though, the best rounds are three and four. That is when the fight is won or lost. The fighters go absolutely balls to the wall in those rounds. During the first few fights, the arena remained pretty empty. But around fight number two, people started to file in. We found it strange that people were only sitting on our side of the arena. We could not figure out why. On top of that everybody was standing up and yelling, which was annoying. Nott finally asked a local why everyone on this side was doing that. He said this was betting side and if we did not plan on betting, we should move to the other side, which was basically empty. We heeded his advice and moved. Turned out to be a good move, because the betting side filled up pretty quickly. Full of people yelling and waving their hands trying to place bets. Looked like it was straight out of  a Jean Claude van Dam movie. People constantly yelling, trying to place bets and going nuts when their fighter would land a solid blow. It was cool to watch from afar.

The fighters themselves are gnarly. They are all lean and mean. The heaviest fight was between two guys weighing only 128lbs, but they looked absolutely ripped! They did not have an ounce of fat on them. Their kicks, punches, elbow strikes, and takedowns were lightning fast. And their knee strikes looked absolutely devastating.

One fight ended only about a minute into the first round after one fighter landed three consecutive kicks to the inside of his opponents knee. The slapping sound the kicks made on contact was loud enough to be heard on top of the yelling and cheering. So you know these guys are kicking hard. After the third kick, the guy just crumpled to the mat. Where the referee immediately called the fight. It looked like the guy’s knee ligaments were toast. I know mine would be after taking three shots like that.

After the first round, there aren’t really any dull moments in the fights. The boxers are not afraid to engage and even when they clench there are still knees and elbows flying. Which is cool, because the pace of the fight does not slow down like in American boxing. The guys must have shins of steel too, because their kicks are being blocked with elbows and forearms, which from personal experience hurts like hell without pads on.

The seventh fight, which was the main event, was by far the best fight. The fighters were the most skilled and polished. The blue fighter had lightning fast punches, while the red fighter had awesome flying knee strikes. It was an awesome fight in all five rounds. In the end blue won, and deservedly so, he landed more solid punches compared to red’s knee strikes which looked gnarly, but rarely made solid contact.

Thai boxing is definitely the most exciting type of martial art I have ever seen. I am really glad I was able to witness that. It is something I will never forget. Thai muy thai fighters are way gnarlier then American muy thai fighters. There were a lot of American and European fighters there watching.  My advice to them is to definitely not do Muy Thai. They will just get their butts kicked. They are too big and too slow. In Thai boxing, speed kills.