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Just a thread of fights I love, as I run into them. I watched this first one last night and it just stayed in my memory, almost as a haunting. Hippy fought everyone, and he fought up a ton. As good a fighter as there ever was, but just too small to make the huge impact others have. In this fight you can see it all play out. He's just too small. He doesn't have the power to really effect his larger, super boss opponent Jaroensap. I love his valiant fight here. watch the fight here

You could perhaps swim? Forceful swimming develops cardio and muscles at least as much as running and some weights lifting. But goes easier on your body. Its no traditional Muay extra training but as long you dont train in a Thailand gym this is no problem....

Thanks Kevin, I hadn't seen this fight before.

I'm 261 fights in and still not seeing what I do in training manifest in the ring. It takes a long time, if it happens at all. Some things will come, some will come after a long time, and some never will (I suspect), but that's okay. The way to improve "Fight IQ" is to fight more, and really more even than that is to spar as much as possible. Kevin and I call it "growing eyes," it's learning to see and feel under the pressure. You do stuff on the pads that you can't do in the context of having an opponent because padwork and "going live" (as they call it in wrestling) are totally different feelings. You stop breathing under pressure. You get tense under pressure. You try to think in a fight and nobody tries to think too much in padwork. You have to learn to feel, and feeling comes from just spending more and more time in as close to that context as possible. I have really good kicks against a bag or my trainer on pads when he's holding for them. But if I pivot off or try to kick him by surprise, my kicks go to hell. They're terribly light or weird angled. He yells at me, "just kick me hard! You won't hurt me!" So, I actually have to focus now on kicking him with the intention of hurting him, knowing that it's a problem for me. So take whatever you had in your fight, punches not being as hard, and try to bring pressure that you felt or being too far away and work on that with your trainer.

Thank you very much for uploading every page. It is appreciated!

thanks for sharing this !!!

To catch kick at top of shin would that mean to not raise leg as high as one would regularly do? Or do I sort of angle the leg/knee? I was considering the low kick destroyer (I'm not really good at it yet or tbh not at all) but wouldn't I hurt my partner?

Yep. Also might be a number 3. Makes your body kick stronger. Way stronger, like a night and day difference. Perhaps just a personal experience, but it feels like there's something that happens to the leg muscles from running that doesn't happen from weight training. It's freaky.

Well depens on gym. I was in Chiang Mai, we had 2runs each day. One is 7AM for 1hour before training and afternoon is 30min run before training. If you're fighting you're also doing 30min of jump rope, so it's like 1h 30min or 2hours of that each day 6times a week. That being said it's not a must, but you def get more out of training that way, you build cardio as much as mental toughness.

I see it like this. There are two main reasons you want to run. 1. Show dedication so the gym invests in you. 2. Build stamina for a fight. If running causes injury there are other ways you can show dedication. And there are other strategies to build stamina. In my experience Thai trainers notice dedication and acknowledge it. I wouldn't be too worried if you can't run so and so many miles, but still show up and demonstrate dedication.

I suppose I'm just looking to get a better idea about the expectations of various gyms including running frequency, distance, and pacing. Just knowing what to be prepared for so I don't crash and burn. I'm over 30 now so a major concern is the balance between pushing through 'hurt' and avoiding actual injuries because my time is running out and I'd rather compete at less than ideal than not compete at all due to injury. Basically I'm getting old and trying to figure out how to deal with it while trying to fight before it's too late.