postivity/accomplishments

[Michelle Nicole]

Sometimes people in our life don't always get what we're doing with muay thai, and no matter how much we try to explain what we've accomplished, it's lost on them. So for those of you who have this love of muay thai and need to share your positive accomplishments with people who get it and understand, do it. There's no better feeling than having someone validate that your accomplishments are indeed something to be proud of.

[Michelle Nicole]

After struggling to get my coach's approval and for him to notice that I'm trying (I've been there for a year...), I finally got my first real compliment from him last night. Great striking and using my legs for thips and kicks (still can't use my left arm for shit), promptly followed by "you need to work on defense". But still, a compliment I didn't expect. I did an internal happy dance.

[Micc]

Michelle, this is an awsome thread! I have a lot of moments when I take notice of something, but have noone to share it with. I share it with the guys at my gym and my trainer (we have a buddy relationship, if I can call it that), but only to some degree. They also like to make a bit fun of me and I'm really serious, especially when it comes to training, so when he says "well that was weak, I'm dissapointed" I'm like: *shocked* and he's just making fun. And when I want to share some great insight I came to realise they don't really seem to understand it, or pick up on deeper topics - at least not during training, out at drinking (non-alcoholic beverages!) it's different ;)

My trainer doesn't really compliment anyone, it must be something really brutal or strong, or skillfull to make an impression on him. 

There was a time when he was like "yea, yea, this was soso" after a sparring session, and then he's writing me on FB the next day saying "the last spar was really good, you showed heart, I liked that" - euphoria on my side! :D

Another good one: last week on one day there were only 3 of us at the gym and I was hitting pads with a guy, and my trainer was filming me from behind my back. (we usually record a lot of footage from training/sparring and then he puts short movies together...or not). And yesterdays he's like "can you send me the video from your pads, I need to see what are we going to work at" :D I was a little happy inside, that he cares enough to think of making me better :D :D :D 

[Michelle Nicole]

I'm glad someone can relate ! I was worried I'd be the only one who understood this lol.

If there's one thing I am grateful for, my main coach doesn't joke when it comes to training, while the other one tends to Joke around a lot. But the main coach.. Never really gotten a compliment from him so it shocked the hell out of me.

[threeoaks]

My positive today is just that I went for the private lesson  I learned a lot of things I can practice at home.  I am actually quite depressed about MT at the moment, but can "act as if" I am not and move forward til my mood changes.  My balance is getting better.  My turnover is better sometimes.  I am starting to depend less on my fists.  The main terror - twisting rather than pivoting in roundhouses (ie; re-tearing the ACL) is diminishing but I still need to work on it.  Its a slog being at the beginning.  Trainer has excellent attitude - gives lots of info, knows I need to practice on my own because of kids (he has some too) so he really stacks it up then goes over what he taught me on the way out (and i will take notes).  Great idea Michelle.

[maybethestars]

This is an awesome thread idea!! Congratulations Michelle, Micc and threeoaks on your personal accomplishments! :D

Something I just wanted to acknowledge for myself is that I've noticed some small improvement on my footwork. Just the simple act of resetting and stepping back after every kick rather than dropping my leg or losing balance and shuffling is starting to become more fluid and easier.

[Marnir]

I used to train at a pretty small gym, with only 2 groups, beginners and the rest. The sparring was also fairly hard I have realised afterwards, so I would get consistently beat up, since almost everyone sparring had more experience than me. I moved towns and stopped training for a year, but got back in another gym a month ago. After training very frequently these past weeks I did some light sparring this saturday and found myself consistently landing a lot more than my opponents could hit me. My sparring partners where not very experienced, but it stil felt good to have the upper hand for once, and finding that a lot of the combinations I had drilled for the last month actually worked. =)

[maybethestars]

My trainer used me to demonstrate some combos today!! :D

[Micc]

My trainer used me to demonstrate some combos today!! :D

That's great!! :D Congrats!! :D I'm often taken by the trainer to demonstrate techniques, but every time he choses me, I'm like "me? me?? really?" :D

Yesterday I was training with a beginner girl, a really small girl, half my size ;) and her face was weird, so I ask her "are you scared of me?" and she answers "a bit...but because you're the best here" ;) ;)

[Michelle Nicole]

Steph, how's the footwork coming ? I've had that problem before, and that is no small accomplishment ! Resetting is difficult to learn.

 

Marnir, that's great ! It's always a great feeling to land something, especially something you've been working on.

 

Micc, I wish people were scared of me sometimes ! Lol. I'm actually usually the one asked if I'm afraid of someone instead! Lol. It's great that your trainer is utilizing you to help demonstrate.

[Micc]

Yeah he does that a lot :) I've actually heard from the 'old' guys with whom I train with for a long time that the new ones are also scared of me when they see me kicking low kicks on the bag :D but they are guys, they don't show it ;)

 

Today I'm going to the new gym!! I hope the guys there will accept me.

[threeoaks]

Yeah he does that a lot :) I've actually heard from the 'old' guys with whom I train with for a long time that the new ones are also scared of me when they see me kicking low kicks on the bag :D but they are guys, they don't show it ;)

 

Today I'm going to the new gym!! I hope the guys there will accept me.

Micc I hope your new gym is wonderful - best of luck.  

[Micc]

It seems this gym is a laid back one, today there was only one guy, apart from me...and the trainer was absent, he send a representative. Soooo...I don't know. I may give it a try this month, it's always a good change of pace :) The training was different than what I'm used to, but interesting. Not much to accomplish there today, but the positive thing is for sure that I went there and tried a different enviroment. 

The guy substituting the trainer asked me halfway through training how long do I train? I said around 3 years and he nodded his head in what I understood as an aknowledgement of my skill :) :) and the guy I was training with wasn't withholding much, he threw pretty decent punches and kicks at me! :)

[Michelle Nicole]

Trying something new..something I'll be doing myself here soon. Glad to hear overall that it went well, Micc :)

[maybethestars]

I'm glad it seems to be a good change of pace for you Micc! I think after awhile you'll realize the kind of environment that works the best for your style of training.

 

Michelle- the footwork actually goes back and forth. Some days I think I'm really making some good progress and other days I feel like my feet are just flailing everywhere in an attempt to get proper balance, but that's how it is with improvement, right? Bits and pieces at a time. Overall what I'm happy about is that noticable difference from when I had my last short muay thai training session half a year ago before I took my break.

What's the new thing you're thinking of trying?

[Michelle Nicole]

A different gym altogether. If I can't get anything out of my Coach, any explanation as to why he's treating me rudely, then I'll need to move to a new gym altogether. I don't want to, but he's making it difficult.

 

Training wise though, I've been training as a Southpaw. Technique wise, I thinK I'm better as a Southpaw. Which goes against everything coach has been training me to do as a traditional. Another reason I need to examine my options.

[Marnir]

Different kind of positivity/accomplishment here, but I feel really exited about it, so I will leave it here. I decided to test out a few other gyms since i felt my current one wasn't very strucutured in training. Yesteday I went to the biggest thai/kickboxingclub in the city. The classes where more structured, but there where almost 30 people on 1 trainer, basically too many people to get any personal guidance. Also, i quickly discovered that the mixing of kickboxing and thai meant that people there generally lacked a clinch game.

Today i tried out another place. It was a smaller club, but it was headed by a thai fighter with nearly 200 fights under his belt and woman who is a former Swedish champion. I showed up for training, we where 8 people there, including the 2 trainers. I got so much more coaching than I am used too. I even got my 1 - 2 corrected. And the trainers joined in sparring as well. Getting tossed around by a 15 kg smaller thai is good fun. Only drawback is that they have slightly fewer trainings than some of the other places, but I expect to learn a lot more from these lessons, so I'm definitely switching gyms and looking forward to growing a lot faster at this new place.

[Michelle Nicole]

Hey Marnir I completely understand where you're coming from. I think that's a great positive to share, and an important one. I am glad you found a better gym for you. :)

[Marnir]

Thanks Michelle. A good gym makes all the difference, and I'm thankful that I have enough experience now that I can pick out the good ones from the bad. Seemingly small things like a well thought out warm up, or that elbows where included in the padwork combos (other gyms seem to leave elbows out for some reason), shows that they are legit. Also the atmosphere was very relaxed and welcoming.

As a southpaw myeself I hope your new stance works out well for you.

[Gavin]

Different kind of positivity/accomplishment here, but I feel really exited about it, so I will leave it here. I decided to test out a few other gyms since i felt my current one wasn't very strucutured in training. Yesteday I went to the biggest thai/kickboxingclub in the city. The classes where more structured, but there where almost 30 people on 1 trainer, basically too many people to get any personal guidance. Also, i quickly discovered that the mixing of kickboxing and thai meant that people there generally lacked a clinch game.

Today i tried out another place. It was a smaller club, but it was headed by a thai fighter with nearly 200 fights under his belt and woman who is a former Swedish champion. I showed up for training, we where 8 people there, including the 2 trainers. I got so much more coaching than I am used too. I even got my 1 - 2 corrected. And the trainers joined in sparring as well. Getting tossed around by a 15 kg smaller thai is good fun. Only drawback is that they have slightly fewer trainings than some of the other places, but I expect to learn a lot more from these lessons, so I'm definitely switching gyms and looking forward to growing a lot faster at this new place.

I tried four gyms, before settling on my current gym in my city. It makes a difference, I think you made a good choice. If you want to add in some extra training, you can always go in by yourself and practice combinations, footwork, heavy bag etc... To be honest I think the sessions where I train by myself are some of the most fruitful in technique development.

[Micc]

Marnin, I'm so happy that you found a better suited gym for yourself! I'm not a southpaw, but I noticed that trainers sometimes forget someone's a southpaw, so they can't really bring the best out of these people. I hope you will learn a lot and grow as a fighter!!

Michelle, how is your search for a southpaw-friendly gym going? :) Maybe there's a gym where the trainer is a southpaw, this will help you a lot, I'm sure of it!

Yesterday there was a holiday here in Poland, so most gyms were closed, but mine was open and we did a "holiday-training", meaning fun training. Apart from the usual stuff we did a little of BJJ, which I never really tried, I know one or two moves, but I had a kind of trauma connected to it (I wrote a blog post yesterday on my blog about it). The point is, it was so much fun!!! :D I'm so happy I got over my anxiety and rolled around on the ground a bit! :D

[Marnir]

Gavin: I agree, you can certainly benefit from working out by yourself as well. Especially now that I get better coaching in class it will be a lot easier to know what to work on in my shadow boxing and on the bag. With only 3 scheduled sessions a week during the summer, I will try to squeeze in some running and bag work on top of that.

Micc: That is true, I have found a lot of less experienced trainers don't know how to adapt their combinations to work for a south paw, so they will ask the pad holder to change stance instead. I personally find that to be a very bad idea, since I am mostly going to face orthordox fighters, so I will usually just adapt the combinations myself.

[threeoaks]

Marnin, I'm so happy that you found a better suited gym for yourself! I'm not a southpaw, but I noticed that trainers sometimes forget someone's a southpaw, so they can't really bring the best out of these people. I hope you will learn a lot and grow as a fighter!!

 

Michelle, how is your search for a southpaw-friendly gym going? :) Maybe there's a gym where the trainer is a southpaw, this will help you a lot, I'm sure of it!

Yesterday there was a holiday here in Poland, so most gyms were closed, but mine was open and we did a "holiday-training", meaning fun training. Apart from the usual stuff we did a little of BJJ, which I never really tried, I know one or two moves, but I had a kind of trauma connected to it (I wrote a blog post yesterday on my blog about it). The point is, it was so much fun!!! :D I'm so happy I got over my anxiety and rolled around on the ground a bit! :D

Can you put a link to your blog Micc?  Sorry if you did before and I missed it BJJ is the wackiest. So great.  Also, got some boo-hooing about having to do padwork with me, a southpaw.  Wait til we spar.  BOO HOO I say.  Too bad. :starwars:

[dtrick924]

Can you put a link to your blog Micc?  Sorry if you did before and I missed it BJJ is the wackiest. So great.  Also, got some boo-hooing about having to do padwork with me, a southpaw.  Wait til we spar.  BOO HOO I say.  Too bad. :starwars:

Micc's blog.  Micc, I'm really enjoying what you've written so far.

[Micc]

Thanks dtrick for linking it, it's in my signature, so I thought it's visible :) :)

And I'm glad you enjoy reading it, I try to really think deeper than usual when I write it, it helps me get things in order and the cool thing is, I'm learning a lot about myself by writing it! :) and I'm still working on the visual side ;) I don't have much good pictures from training I can use, but I will sort it out sometime ;)

Today I went to class and as it's a holiday long weekend, I was the only one there, so I basically had a private class with my trainer :) :) The best thing was, he pushed me to do sommersaults (I hope it's the right word, like you roll over you head to the front or back, or over your shoulder and so on) and he also has shown me some new types of sommersaults. He knows I'm not comfortable with rolling over my head, so it was nice to practice it in peace and quite on my own with his guidance. I learned a lot! :)