Kevin von Duuglas-Ittu

I'd agree with what a lot of people are saying about confidence, and ask if the experiences you had previously were ones that built your confidence. It sounds a little like it may have been a mixed experience? A lot of times it isn't so much the gym you are at, it's the trainer you have. So maybe the gyms have been good, but a different trainer might make them better? You can sometimes get focus from a different trainer by taking privates with them. Because you are asking about alternatives, a few ideas. 4 weeks is a good amount of time, enough to make a significant change, and if you focused on something like clinch (which isn't easy to find) you could radically change your ability to win against opponents who may not be so focused, unless you are already a clinch fighter. Winning in tie-ups can make big differences. Also, a gym to consider might be Sitmonchai gym (not a clinch gym), in that it is very fight oriented, has a good track record when dealing with female fighters, and has one of the best low-kick instructors in the world in Kru Dam. It's about 2 hours outside of Bangkok in a pretty quiet part of Thailand, and might really give you that "fight camp" experience you may be seeking. Also of course, Sylvie has an open invitation to female fighters to come and train with her. Women are really taking her up on it. One woman, Sandra, came to prepare for the Swedish championships and the IFMAs, and really experienced growth in a short amount of time. She became the 48 kg champion last week against much more experienced opponents, and is coming back in the Summer. The gym is not for everyone, you need to be very self-motivated, but you would basically get to train along with Sylvie who is constantly training for fights, and you would definitely learn some clinch. It's also a pretty inexpensive gym, which may help in matters.

So hard to read what really is the case, but one has to admit that her team has become very media savvy. Apparently her lawyers have just recently filed for patents around the phrase "Fuck Them All" 5 in particular to the abbreviation FTA. Rousey is no longer just a person fighting, if she ever was only that. She's the center of a moving media event, and the commerce that goes along with it. When you patent phrases you are going to be using in the future, that's some serious premeditation.

I'm not completely sure it is specifically marriage in Thailand. Though most definitely there is a widespread ethic that women should not fight. You even see it among potential female western fighters who come and get a Thai fighter boyfriend. Anecdotally, we've seen potential or current fighters become less active as fighters, and some be strongly steered away from fighting, when a Thai ex-fighter boyfriend relationship starts. It does not seem to be the case that the men, because they are fighters, see fighting as something the female should do. In fact, quite the opposite. Because they are or have been fighters their female counterparts should not fight. Again, anecdotally. To understand this though in almost all circumstances Muay Thai in Thailand is work. It's not glamorous, by and large, and most people think about females fighting: Why would you do that? And Sylvie's been asked many times why I would allow or want her to fight. It just makes little sense, even if you are talented in it. It is very rare for a female fighter to make any real money, and most women want to stop fighting before 20. They've been doing it, usually, since they were a kid, and if they didn't have to fight - due to circumstances - they wouldn't. There is almost none of the "martial arts for the beauty" or "personal glory" involved in the decision to be a fighter. It's just work. And it is work that isn't sustainable, not to mention work that can scar you. You can add to that that female Thai fighters really have no career path once they start becoming very good. Sylvie wrote about this in her Judging Youth article. When Thai boys start really excelling at around the age of 15 and are climbing top talent in the Bangkok stadia, Thai girls start running out of top opponents. Not only is the pool much smaller, but nobody wants to fight them because in order to fight you have to lay significant money down. There is no sense of "Hey, let's fight and see who the best for the good and glory of the sport". It's about money. There will be some high profile matchups, but there simply is no scene, no promotional structure, along which a very good 15 year old female fighter will grow into a great one. There are rare exceptions like with Sawsing and Chommanee, women who become national stars, but even they are probably not earning a significant living, very infrequently fight, and probably would prefer to just retire. I never get the feeling that any Thai female fighter around 20 wants to fight anymore, at least in the sense that is expressed in the west. Sawsing is an interesting example of course, because she recently got married (to a fighter) and had a baby, and is having a comeback fight. This is a strong exception and it's interesting to watch. There are other examples of female fighters coming back to Muay Thai at or around after college. Zaza has been having a very slow comeback (she fought in Japan when young) - she is the girlfriend of one of the Pinto brothers - but does not really seem to want to fight. We've heard she asks such a high fee it is very hard to book her. I don't know if she has fought in many months after a few initial victories, and when she did fight she seemed to be facing girls she knew she could win against. It really appeared, at least to me, as if she was coming back to Muay Thai to maybe further a larger singing or acting career, which is pretty interesting, because to some degree being a top female fighter has become something of a marketable media image. This feels new. So, given all this context I would imagine that if you add marriage into the mix it would definitely create a possible: Now it is time to move onto the next stage of your life. There is a feeling that female fighting is for when you are young (early and mid teens), but then because there is no future, you move on. Phetjee Jaa says that she wants to join the military, when we asked her. There doesn't seem to be a vision of future world greatness. As a sidenote about culture, Tom and Dee-ism (a form of Thai lesbian relationship) is pretty common among female Thai fighters (at least it seems to be from what we've seen). It also is strongest in the demographic of youth. But unlike a more western concept of firm sexual identity, this too is often treated as a stage or a fad by families, who then at a certain point expect their daughters to stop experimenting, get married, and get on with their life. This can be very painful for women more committed to the life choice, as Dees leave and start a straight life, because its expected. I'm not drawing a complete connection here, but only to say that there is foundation for a "Now it is time to grow up" judgment from society directed towards women who have lived a life in their teens. This could tie into a similar "time to grow up" attitude towards fighting.

I have to say that it got a little whiplash, unexpectedly going from suicide to babies. I was totally sympathetic with her over-wrought feeling, but when she bounced to having to stay alive for her man's babies, it kinda made me reconsider her as a whole. I think she's been incredibly brave and strong bearing the weight of UFC popularity as a woman - so much pressure, but I don't know...this seemed a little unstable sounding. How terrible to have your every thought scrutinized though. What did you think Emma?

We might be seeing a Chommanee fight then! Or Teresa. Good to have a high caliber female name moving to Thailand.

Really good post and thread. Sylvie interviewed a big Bangkok promoter who is involved in a plan to build an International Kard Chuk stadium, I believe in Mae Sai (?, don't remember), in order to promote Thai vs border country fighting. He has a big vision, but this is something that might mean a lot for Khmer fighting. An interesting aspect of this is that there seems to be something of an ideological tension within Thailand about the history or source of Muay Thai techniques. There seems to be a strong effort to portray Muay Thai has having a "royal" lineage, and align Muay Thai with nationalist efforts, protecting the nation, etc., distancing itself from techniques found either in the North or in Isaan (with its Khmer origins). There seem to be noble vs populist narratives in struggle, making the loss of Khmer fighting knowledge a hole in history. So sad to think of the loss of Khmer teachers during the brutality of the Khmer Rouge (albeit a tragedy of such an enormous proportion, hard to single that out). This absence though draws out what is so absolutely unique about Thailand, perhaps in the world. The thing that makes Thailand like no other place, at least in this point in history, is the sheer number of fights, both in individual careers but also just nationally. It has a history of knowledge and continuity that is incredibly fight-tested, across tens of thousands of persons. Yes, great Thai fighters of the past are often neglected by their own, we know one fighter who was the best 118 lb fighter in the land who now just manages a bar, and there are countless stories like this; and yes, formerly esteemed gyms are now becoming more like adventure tourist centers, but still all this fighting is done in the context of a huge bed knowledge and memory. In a complete side note, the loss of masters makes me think of this very good documentary about the diaspora and loss of Kung Fu masters, much recommended: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=--DlclqbmeM

I can't say this universally, to all of Thailand, but I found that Thai culture would be comfortable to an introvert. I'm an introvert. I like being left alone and just watching things. I find that at least in the broad sense Thais will let you be, and let you go about who you are. Of course there are subtleties, and as you stay here long term you see things with more detail, but at the surface there is a lot of space given. You may find that you really like it.

There are some "not many people" options. I understand that introversion can be strong. I'm not sure if you mean not many westerners (people who speak English and may try to talk with you), or not many people at all, Thais included? One option I can think of is training at Sylvie's gym, Petchrungruang, here in Pattaya, but only in the mornings. In the mornings there are very few people, in fact sometimes it is only Pi Nu (the head instructor/gym owner) and Sylvie. Usually though, not more than 4 or 5 people total. These are very quiet times. In the afternoon it's much busier, with Thais and westerners mixed. But it's not a big gym, it's a family style gym. Once you get the mornings down, maybe you would be more open to the afternoons - or you could strategically come earlier or later in the afternoons, when training hasn't started up much, or is winding down. Another one that is pretty small is Sor. Klinmee gym in Pattaya, again, another family style gym. Maybe 15 people in the space in the afternoons, from what we saw (Sylvie trains there sometimes for clinch). Not sure what the mornings are like, they are probably slow. Another thing that you could do is to go to a non-expensive gym, but use the extra money to invest in private sessions with an instructor. Usually these are done between the mornings and afternoons. If so, you might have the gym to yourselves, or not many people around.

Really, just because you train in Thailand doesn't really mean you train well in clinch at all, especially as a female, and certainly not advanced clinch. Ashley's clinch looked fairly rudimentary - physically strong, but basic - to me. Sylvie had a very hard time finding clinch instruction or training her first two and a half years here, even though she pushed for it. It takes a long time to develop clinch. After Tiffany lost to Caley in the clinch, and Caley is one of the best female clinch fighters in the world, principally because she's trained it for years, it looked like she had paid attention to this weakness in the Alldis fight. But now I'm not so sure. In any case, it's something that surprised me in the fight.

I was surprised that Tiffany looked like she struggled in the clinch, after looking like she had improved in that area vs Alldis. Ashely's clinch really wasn't all that sophisticated, mostly just a basic plumb grab and turn, but almost every time they locked up she had the advantage. I was also impressed with Ashley overall, not only her skill set, but also her size. She's fought much smaller than this, but it didn't really look like the size mismatch I anticipated. Eventually Tiffany just wore her down with all the multiple strikes, but for a time there (I think in the 3rd round?) I felt there was an opening for her to win the fight. It wasn't what I expected.

I would seriously doubt PJJ crushing a girl with 6 or 7 kg on her. I suspect she'll just point fight her, and turn her a few times in the clinch. But it sounds like, if you had to guess, Saya will not fight PJJ. I'm fairly sure PJJ's family wants to fight her, but I guess they don't really have much to say about the matter. In the end, for them it will be money that will talk. PJJ fights where the money is.

If so, it would likely be an amateur fighter fighting her first pro fight There just are almost zero 100 lb fighters in the US. Amy Davis, I don't know if you remember her, she fought in Japan, at 105 lbs couldn't find someone to fight in North America for years, and had to eventually move to MMA. It was very sad.

Charlie, did you get any sense that she wanted to fight Phetjee Jaa? This seems like the most natural matchup, no? They are bringing Phetjee Jaa in for this circus matchup now, creating buzz, but obviously with PJJ at 44 kg, a fight with Saya seems like it is inevitable.

It could be that she was just being modest about clinch, but what sent up a red flag was the somewhat honest sounding claim that she remembered the techniques she learned when she was in Thailand. From everything that Sylvie told me she really never got beyond the very basics in Thailand, things like how to tension the body, certain positions. You can't really learn clinch that way. It would be like learning wrestling from a few "moves". You have to train it hours and hours and hours, really for years. Sylvie's been at it for maybe a year and a half, heavy work, every day against adequate training partners (which Saya likely does not have, they are hard to find even in Thailand), and she's still only progressed to maybe intermediate clinch (which is still very high for a female fighter). Clinch in Muay Thai is maybe a little bit like "ground game" in MMA. You can't just add it, or learn some principles. It has to be rooted in the heavy practice of an art. Even if she has a trainer who is knowledgeable in clinch, he would have to be near her physical size, and she'd have to be dedicating pretty heavy hours to it to progress. This was a problem Sylvie faced in Thailand before moving to Pattaya. It's not easy to train for a female that size even in Thailand. re: "Being a student means that she doesn't have a lot of freedom when she can leave the country so odds are she is going to be fighting Japanese fighters or foreign fighters brought to Japan, plus it seems that she wants to fight in America or Europe before she retires." If she stays at 100 lbs, I'm curious which foreign fighters she would imagine she could fight? Perhaps there are some in Europe, but this is a very small pool of fighters. It was cool that she thought Lion Fight would be a great show, but it seems that Lion Fight is having some cash flow issues. I suspect there would not be a kind of money that would be able to bring her to the US. And again, who would she fight at 100 lb, or even 105 lbs? re: She reminds me a lot of Erika.They were both very quiet yet serious about Muay Thai, but they mixed their love of Muay Thai with Japanese Fighting Spirit for lack of a better term, so they prefer to go forward. I know Sylvie really liked her. Perhaps one day fates will meet up and bring them together again. It was certainly a wonderful coincidence that had them training together. re: Her coach actually asked if i was you, when he saw me. Saya just laughed at him and said no. So awesome Charlie! Makes me smile.

Really nice to hear her thoughts Charlie, great little interview. I fear she'll never fight Sylvie again...at least, it will probably be smart not to. That she doesn't really train clinch, and Sylvie herself counts that she didn't really know clinch the last time they fought back in 2014, it would probably not turn out that well, just as a match up of styles. In that vein, it's probably best that she fight Phetjee Jaa, as soon as possible, while she still has a weight advantage. But again, the clinch even at this point would be too much. All the top Thai fighters are clinch fighters. Puengsiam, Loma, Jee Jaa. Nice though that she hopes to fight once a month, and on Lion Fight as well. Thanks for bringing this all forward. Great reporting. p.s. it's also kind of funny that Saya doesn't know who holds the WMC belt...because I'm not sure that anyone else does. Your guess of Little Tiger is about as good as any, though I thought she lost it to Pizza (who then retired) in their last fight.

Very good linked article by Joanna Harper, who is a trans female distance runner and was a strong voice at the IOC meeting. Most compelling are her own studies of trans distance times. Do transgender athletes have an edge? I sure don’t. "I understood that this would happen to me, too. But I was surprised how fast it happened. Within three weeks of starting hormone therapy in August 2004, I was markedly slower. I didn’t feel any different while I was running. But I could no longer match my previous times. By 2005, when I was racing in the women’s category, the difference was astounding. I finished one 10K in 42:01 — almost a full five minutes slower than I’d run the same course two years earlier as a man. Interestingly, when I looked up my times in USA Track & Field’s age-grading tables — used to compare runners of all ages and both sexes — I found that I was just as competitive as a 48-year-old woman as I had been as a 46-year-old man. I was curious whether my experience was typical. There had never been any studies of transgender athletes, only of transgender women generally. So over the next seven years, I collected almost 200 race times from eight distance runners who were transgender women (including myself as runner No. 6). My research, published last month in the Journal of Sporting Cultures and Identities, found that collectively, the eight subjects got much slower after their gender transitions and put up nearly identical age-graded scores as men and as women, meaning they were equally — but no more — competitive in their new gender category. (The outlier was a runner who had raced recreationally as a 19-year-old male and became serious about the sport —"

So interesting Kristen. So basically they are defining the female gender by two elements: public declaration, and minimization of testosterone, and leaving genitalia out: 2.1. The athlete has declared that her gender identity is female. The declaration cannot be changed, for sporting purposes, for a minimum of four years. 2.2. The athlete must demonstrate that her total testosterone level in serum has been below 10 nmol/L for at least 12 months prior to her first competition (with the requirement for any longer period to be based on a confidential case-by-case evaluation, considering whether or not 12 months is a sufficient length of time to minimize any advantage in women's competition). 2.3. The athlete's total testosterone level in serum must remain below 10 nmol/L throughout the period of desired eligibility to compete in the female category. This is kind of epic.

I think its best to treat it as a non-expiring code. If we ask them if it expires, they'll probably put a date on it!

Jen, do you already know which gyms you are looking at, or the area of Thailand you might want to stay long term?

Just read up on Alex Gong (in the video). What a tragedy. On August 1, 2003, after a hit and run driver crashed into Gong's parked car in the Fairtex Gym parking lot in San Francisco, Gong pursued the car on foot. Gong caught up and confronted the driver, who was still in his car at a nearby intersection. Witnesses say the driver then shot Gong at point blank range and fled in his vehicle. Gong was pronounced dead at the scene.

Very nice seeing young Jongsanan. And then there is the English speaking instructor knowing/showing less than his Thai demo guy. Always this gap between very good, western boiled-down, rationalized technique, and actual 150 fight technique.

There are many ways of generating power, spinning around is only one of them. Sakmongkol was one of the hardest kicking Thai, and he trains to not spin around. In fact you almost never see top Thais spinning around and they kick with great force. Think about if you were swinging an axe hard attempting to chop a tree down. Would you expect to spin around if you missed your target? If you were swinging a baseball bat, trying to hit the ball, would you say you only were swinging hard if you spun around in a circle? I believe that like the swing of a bat, not spinning around forces you to generate more of your power with your hips, and throws the force more forward, at and through the target.

Hi TZ22 - I've been working from Thailand online ever since Sylvie and I moved here, and it is really the only way we could have stayed. The problem with working from Thailand isn't really the connection issues - Sylvie wrote a detailed blog post on all the things you may face when trying to stay connected - but rather with having the job itself. I already was working online before we moved. I'm a Social Media marketing consultant and already had clients for several years. IF you can get dependable work online, it is definitely feasable technically. Thailand's digital infrastructure has really improved. There are of course things you can run into and may need to work around, but it can be done. I will say, working from Thailand, online, is just like working from anywhere else. It is not a vacation. I spend very long hours inside the apartment, sometimes not seeing much outside the walls for days or weeks. I could literally be anywhere, in any room. Plus, and this depends where you live, but generally if you are going to live here long term you will find a place to stay which is cheaper, which means that it will be a part of town that is not vacation-y at all. You live where Thais live. For us this is fantastic, because we love Thailand and the Thai culture. But it is not glamorous. For instance we live in Pattaya which is notorious for its tourism of various kinds, but we hardly see any of it. We are in Thai neighborhoods, or Sylvie is at the gym. That's the way we like it. Pattaya, for this reason, is actually more "Thai" than Chiang Mai was for us, despite having a tourist reputation. The division between tourist areas and Thai areas is pretty strong. Long term westerners have different reactions to the culture. It seems like many of them get frustrated with the Thai way. It is pretty common to hear westerners talk about "The Thais" with an eye-roll or what not. It's an ex-Pat thing to complain about Thailand. Sylvie and I don't get it. Even when we run into big difficulties, or systemic limitations, they feel okay. You learn to just roll with and appreciate everything for what it is. There is no place we'd rather be.

Don't know if you've seen this, but this is the classic Bas Rutten video on generating power with the out-turned foot. The Thai round kick is one of the most deceptively complicated techniques for westerns I think. Sylvie for years had serious trouble with it, despite lots and lots of kicking. It was never fluid or fast. But she eventually kicked herself to a powerful version through tons of work on the bag and pads. But then you see Thai kids kicking fluidly in almost no time. I think a lot of it has to do with the looseness and openness of the hips (culturally), and probably something to do with the Thai squat. But in the end there is no "Thai kick", there are thousands of Thai kicks. I've seen Thais open up and turn their standing foot very wide, sometimes even ending up with it pointed the other way. And I've seen Thais not turn or pivot on the foot at all and get great power.

There is no "right" answer on this. These are all just different kicking techniques, and there is a ton of variability in Muay Thai. It's become very common to drive the hip forward with the whip of the arm. 5 years ago Sean Wright explained the torque of the arm really nicely to Sylvie, likening it to how a runner swings their arms when they run. But it should be lose and easy, like that, like a runner. One would not tear their labrum running, for instance. You can't really catch the audio, but you can see it here: But yes, you can also generate torque by stepping across, or combining the two movements even. Or turning your stepping foot "out" to open and spring load the hip. But very differently old Boran fighters in the Muay Chaiya tradition, didn't even move their kicking arm at all, they just kept it in place by their face. This is how Kru Lek teaches the Chaiya kick in Bangkok now. It looks very "odd" to a modern eye, but it shows how much difference there can be in Muay Thai and it's history. The decision on which technique needs, in the west, to be made probably using two criteria: what is most comfortable or expressive of explosiveness, stability, fluidity for me? and: where am I going to get the best instruction continuity from my teachers? In Thailand most of the time there isn't much correction at all. Everyone finds their way, mimicking others, adopting some things, discarding others.