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The role of punches in scoring (and a side story how my gym got bombed)


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Here's a very long story as a context to my question on how to use hands in muay thai scoring. 

I started fighting in Thailand 2019. My gym in Bangkok couldn't get me fights so I found my own way, inspired by Sylvie. After three pro fights basically on my own, my gym wanted to set up fights for me at MBK in Bangkok. Then I tore a meniscus in a spartan race and then I lost my job. Found a new job in Yangon, Myanmar. Started training at a lethwei gym trying to heal my knee waiting to go back to Thailand to fight. 

Then I injured my other knee. Second wave. I kept training waiting for my gym to open. I realised covid will drag on and I got mentally ready to fight lethwei. So with knee injuries, my hands, elbows and head became my focus. I discovered lethwei is not just douchebag LeDuc and headbutts, but many beautiful techniques.

My gym opened. Co-owned by a ONE championship MMA star. I was getting ready. 

Then 1 February 2021 happened. Military seized power. Since then, its been a nightmare. Before I moved to Myanmar, all my muay thai trainers warned me "Myanmar is a dangerous country". Well, now it is. I've had machine guns up my face. Friends being threatened. Daily I hear explosions. 

When army started using snipers, killing civilians, childrens, just anyone randomly with shots to the head. Or by arresting them, torturing them to death in prison. The youngest killed was a 5-year old playing in her own living room. 

Well, people started fighting back. Six decades of being ruled by Tatmadaw -which is only fighting a single war: against its own people. And an international community paralysed. People got organised to fight back. 

So did my gym. I saw defense trainings happening. I saw people coming going. I knew what was happening. I saw the pain and frustration of the people who had experienced a smell of democracy for a decade, and then it was again taken away from them. Just like that. 

Yet, each morning my teachers would train me like any fighter. Pushing me. Challenging me. Rewarding me for my hard work with massage and cold water to my forehead.

One night, 1am, I got a lot of calls. There was an explosion at my gym. People told me not to go to training in the morning. Apparently a selfmade bomb had exploded and severely injured my teacher and left the gym in ruins. My teacher's brothers (one pro footballer, one working with development) took my teacher who had severe burns to a private hospital. Another teacher went into hiding. 

The army got hold of that, took my teacher to an army hospital. The brothers, girlfriends and other trainers were brought to prison. Where they remain.

I haven't been back to my gym since. My gloves are still there. 

I'm training outside with a friend who used to work for the same gym and is traumatised too. Worried for his friends. Hiding from authorities calling him, trying to get info. I don't know the case of my teachers who are in custody, just that what they are charged with is severe. 

He and I. We. Just. Keep. Trying. Knowing lethwei might die with this. But still, finding joy in training. And my trainer, all he dreams of is getting to Thailand to work and fight again. 

Anyhow. After this novel/emotional dumping  Somehow through this, my punches, my uppercuts my hooks are getting way stronger. No gloves training is no biggie, my hands are strong. 

I'm trying to improve my kicks but rainy season, outside with no mats, no bag it's hard. So even though I think faster with my legs, my hands are becoming my best weapons. 

And I plan to go to Thailand in a couple of months and just hoping I can get just _one_ fight to channel all this I've experienced. But I don't know how to use my hands in a smart way in muay thai scoring? Just go for KO or do you get points for combinations and dominating fight through hands? 

 

 

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To the question at the end - I seem to remember that you are experienced in Thailand's Muay Thai - the Golden Rule regarding punches in Thailand is "there has to be effect". In other words, you don't just get credit for throwing them (ie not for "being active" or "being aggressive"). In fact, if you are being active or aggressive and missing all the while, it actually can score against you. You are exerting effort, but it is wasted, inefficient, non-potent effort. This goes to the question of whether you should go for knockouts, or for "dominating" your opponent with punch combinations. The answer is: which one would you more likely show effect (physical or psychological) on your opponents? That's the approach you should use.

This really changes though if you fight on the new 3 round Entertainment Muay Thai shows (Superchamp, Hardcore, even Thai Fight or ONE). These shows seem to favor aggression for its own sake. Throwing 10 hard punches that miss can very well earn you a round, especially if you are coming forward. In those shows generally the more you throw the better, as long as you aren't being caught on the counter.

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5 hours ago, Kevin von Duuglas-Ittu said:

This goes to the question of whether you should go for knockouts, or for "dominating" your opponent with punch combinations. The answer is: which one would you more likely show effect (physical or psychological) on your opponents? That's the approach you should use.

'

This above is really helpful, thank you. It makes me think a lot. 

All I know about muay thai scoring is what I learned here. And just from observing, which can be deceiving.

A follow up question, not sure if it can be answered easily. 

If a fighter is throwing kicks and knees and the opponent checks them or takes them but remains seemingly unphased by them, yet remains the more passive one in terms of attacks, but the attacks, mainly through hands, are sharp and have more impact. The scoring would be in favor of the more passive, but sharper fighter? Dominance, technique and control of fight narrative wins the fight (generally)? Regardless of number of attacks?

 

 

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18 hours ago, LengLeng said:

If a fighter is throwing kicks and knees and the opponent checks them or takes them but remains seemingly unphased by them, yet remains the more passive one in terms of attacks, but the attacks, mainly through hands, are sharp and have more impact. The scoring would be in favor of the more passive, but sharper fighter? Dominance, technique and control of fight narrative wins the fight (generally)? Regardless of number of attacks?

A couple of things here.

1. In Thailand's Muay Thai  you can't just "appear unphased" by kicks and knees, and nullify points. Kicks and knees to the body hold the additional "score" of showing control over the body center, just by landing. This is different than punches, which require the physical and psychological effect for score. Yes, by bluffing no impact from kicks and knees you minimize the score, but these are still points against you.

2. It really depends on what you mean by "passive". You need to know what the score is to read the behaviors of both fighters. Thais, traditionally, once they have the lead, retreat and "protect" the lead. This can be read as lacking in aggression by westerners, when in fact this is often pulling away in the fight. If a fighter who is behind in the fight starts marching forward, and throwing a lot...but not having a lot of impact, this fighter would be seen as actually falling further and further behind. They are "chasing".

Sharpness in technique does really matter though. It shows self-control, control over the fight space, balance, timing. If you are truly displaying dominance over the fight space, then this will score.

I can't quite picture the fight engagement you have in your mind here, but if you are checking kicks and avoiding knees, and landing impactful shots, you should be winning the fight...though that also has to be put in the context of who is advancing, who is retreating, and what the score of the fight is.

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I should add to the above, in case it isn't obvious: You cannot trade landed punches for landed kicks, all other things being equal, in Thailand's traditional Muay Thai. Punching fighters have an additional burden of evidence.

I'll also add this. As a female fighter, while the traditional Muay Thai scoring system does not favor you as a punching fighter, you are favored in another way, at least when fighting Thai female fighters. Because they grew into the sport organized around the high scores of kicks (and to a lessor extent knees), they are much more adept at defending them, and much less adept at defending punches (to be very general about it). What you are throwing has an additional burden for scoring, but maybe has a higher chance of landing. You see this play out in the very different 3 round entertainment Muay Thai fights where Thai female fighters are asked to fight well out of their element. They are punch-heavy, no-retreat allowed promotions.

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Thank you @Kevin von Duuglas-Ittuthis is helpful. 

As I have a lot of respect for traditional muay thai rules, these would always be my goal. I hate to be the farang going for KO to avoid dealing with the intricacies of muay thai scoring. To show understanding of the rules, is to me to respect the art. I'm not sure you would agree, but when Alyssia fought Stamp and won I saw the power of the strong basics of maintaining posture and using kicks as first weapon. I loved it. She didn't use much technique. Just basic muay thai and won. 

Newer kind of lethwei is very hand focused and their kicks are of the "stabbing version". Straight butterfly knife stab kicks. Older fights are more similar to muay thai. Exchange of beautiful kicks and only headbutt when it actually serves a purpose. I'm trying to learn this. Rather than the brutal: go forward and attack with no plan and full aggression. 

My desire would always be to go for technique. Sadly, seems like my hands are now, when I actually learnt how to transfer power from hip through shoulder to hands, my strongest weapons. But my preference would always be muay thai. I'm not sure, but the refinement Thailand managed to do and the national ownership of the sport is something neighbouring countries could learn from. I also believe, it benefits women fighters. 

It's good advice on the 3 round "sensational fights". I just don't like them. But beggars can't be choosers. I'd take any fight if even possible this year. 

Fighting under traditional muay thai rules to me are what would benefit me the most in terms of learning. Learning patience, calmness, non-aggresive violence and simply technique. 

To be honest, after this exchange I'll work on checking kicks and combine landing kicks following up with punches. 

Thank you. Not much in the public space on muay thai scoring. So it's appreciated. 

 

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3 hours ago, LengLeng said:

My desire would always be to go for technique. Sadly, seems like my hands are now, when I actually learnt how to transfer power from hip through shoulder to hands, my strongest weapons. But my preference would always be muay thai.

From your description, my personal advice would be to just use your hands to stress your opponent. Just keep on them, keep touching them, bring the power down, get them holding their breath...and then go for finishes later in the fight with hard weapons (kicks, knees or a power shot). If you are that superior to your opponent. Hands are great stressors. This kind of crescendoing tempo is very "Thai". Touch, touch, touch, touch...damage. Touch, touch, touch, touch...finish.

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  • 2 weeks later...

A little aside note re punching / boxing moments in Muay.  Im thinking on the match between Calista and Pheetjeeja  a couple of years ago.  When Calista was still the young promising european junior, trying to make a carrieer as pro in Thailand, beginning with not too difficult matches.   (and yeah, she did managed just fine although a couple of setbacks).  I dont know what Calistas manager planned.  Did he thought Calista had now matured to meet a strong grandmaster, or did he thought it were nice for Calista to meet another good junior??

And Pheetjeeja, whom at this time abandoned Muay and become a boxer...  Pheetjeeja thus did made here a temporary come back. It was visible she didnt no longer care much about what others thought... Why, she was no longer a Muay fighter:   She did climbed in above the ropes!

 

And as Pheetjeejas transition into a boxer was now done and complete, she hardly kicked anything.   She just wore down poor Calista with series of heavy punches... Calista was brave, it was visible she was determined to endure whatever was coming... Whatever the costs...

But after long and severe battering, enough was enough... 

I do admire Calista she did continued and took other difficult matches, becoming even a specialist on Kard Chuek.

Thus.  Well done punching and boxing does pays off in Muay too....    🙂

 

Ps.  Pheetjeeja returned to Muay.  Stronger and better than ever...  She continues her tradition of not using her patented horrible horse kicks against women, but she has become instead a master of elbows...  AND her hard punching, together with her fully mature physical strengh, AND all the technical skills she always had,  makes her a fearsome opponent to any grandmaster.

 

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One doesn't have to think of emotion in terms of Buddhism, but it can help. This is to say, the directionality of the rise of emotion is toward Instinct. One wants to open a two-way door toward the Unconscious. Because Muay Thai is trained also through fatigue and an aesthetic of dominance, intensification (and its attendant rise of emotion) can also occur through fatigue or dominance. Together they can create a very large doorway, weaving together both the materiality of the Body (fatigue) and the psychodynamics of personhood and social status (hierarchies). Turning to the aesthetic of Muay, its conditioning of Ruup (body posture and form), its characteristic display of presence and being at ease (physically), its flattening of emotion, allows the doorways of intensification/emotion to remain open, productive and expressive. Ideally perhaps, emotion per se is stretched out toward Mind, experienced more so as direct intensification alone, a portal to Unconscious Instinct, and the formative powers of what one is. The Mythos of the Self and the Fighter Thailand's Muay Thai is culture bound, which means that its figures of significance and valorization are drawn from the culture itself. It operates within a Thai-Siamese mythos. For this reason great legends of Thailand's Muay Thai past, let's say of the Golden Age of the sport or before, stand in the same light as the gods that are performed and invoked in the Ram Muay. In my discussion of the 10 Principles of Muay Thai I call this "be the god". The meaning of this is to be understood within the mythos of the Unconscious, both at a personal level, but also at the collective level of a people. The fighter in the ring draws up from the Past (the Unconscious) the supra-personal forces that go beyond their mere ego (constructed identity), so that they can assume a symbolic capacity within the ring, making of the art a collective rite. This occurs through the aesthetics of the sport, and the ways in which the fighter has attained the capacity to transmute intensifications into Instinct and Thought syntheses. In this sense fighters can become embodiments of a collective, mythic past, drawing on the forms of what anchors a people, but remain inaccessible to Intelligence alone. The openness of this capacity is achieved in the openness of training, through play and the aesthetics of Muay. Time and the Nature of Muay (the Natural) Bergson's concept of Duration (la durée) is an important building block for understanding what is happening in traditional training and in fighting. A duration for Bergson is an unbreakable envelope of Time. Returning to the example of cinema, a shot holds a certain complete shape to itself. If you edited it in any way you would break what it is. Bergson describes duration as Time what is "swollen with its past". Just as a story is told in a narration, the ending of the story is swollen with its history, the telling of it from the beginning. A duration is anything that cannot be broken, in terms of Time. There may be durations within a duration, unbreakable envelopes within the duration, this does not disturb its wholeness. The image is given of music where one has the musical piece (a duration), and individual notes played (a duration), as well as refrains, phrasings, melodies, etc. Our lives are durations, our days, our thoughts, our bodies, anything that swells with its past, with the passing of time, so to complete it. When one enters a Thai kaimuay to train, or enters a ring to fight, one is entering as a duration (in fact a duration made up of many durations). And one is joining a duration, the event. The rhythms and shapes of the event envelop your duration hold you in concert with other durations you will encounter. In a kaimuay these are the patterns of training, the aesthetics and customs of the art as trained; in the ring it is the aesthetics of Muay as it is fought. This is the set-up. As you train your duration, what is the you of you, your temporal wholeness will be challenged by intensities of speed, fatigue and dominance. This will lead to intensification, and usually emotion. As Thought ceases to be able to manage one's place, one's wholeness, one opens up the the Unconscious/Instinct, to draw on resources that allow your duration, your rhythm, your wholeness to persist. The Time of which you are made (your duration) is enriched by the rise and integration of Instinct, and that which usually falls below consciousness. Your duration is expanded. Fighting is the art of breaking another's duration, their rhythm and tempo which makes them whole. This is why Muay Thai is principally a Time War, and why it occurs under an aesthetic of narration (the scoring is narratively anchored, and not abstract point counting). The techniques of engagement are temporal battles, strikes holding their own duration within the larger duration, attempts to break the unbreakable coherence of the duration of the other. This is why Ruup and continuity play such a large role in Muay Thai aesthetics and skill building. The Natural, the Tammachat, comes from the presence and integration of Instinct, the presence of the Unconscious, which is engendered to flow with Thought. This is achieved in training, through the application of intensities and the invitation of modulated emotion/affect.       Bergson on Instinct and Thought, from Deleuze and the Unconscious (2007): one can leave aside the direction of this argument toward frenzy and the mystic. Important is the relational dichotomy of Instinct and Intelligence.      
    • Instinct and the Thai Principle of Tammachat (ธรรมชาติ) This will remain somewhat obscure, as it's hard to fill the gap in my recent reading, but thoughts on the nature of Tammachat (natural), which is one of the more essential, basic yet obscured qualities of Thailand's Muay Thai - and one that non-Thais most deeply struggle with. How can something be "natural", which is trained? They seem a contradiction, or at the very least in strong tension. Into the gap Westerners try to place concepts like "muscle memory", as if you can create a new causal chain, a new "memory" in your body which then operates with something like "naturalness". This supposed manufactured "muscle memory" is often trained with great tension - a very high degree of unrelaxed, biomechanically precise constant correction. It does not really solve the problem of Tammachat, and instead inserts a mechanical bridge between between what I'll call Instinct and Thought. I'm drawing from these two passages in the excellent book Deleuze and the Unconscious (2007, Christian Kerslake) discussing the influence of the philosopher Bergson. Bergson is concerned with how matter and memory work together. In a certain sense we all have a powerful inheritance of memory, something which includes not all of our conscious experiences, but all of our experiences, much of it unconscious. This is not just things that we can recall to our mind, but rather the very large raft of causes well below the threshold of our awareness, including our biological instincts. Instincts are wisdom, skills, reactions, frames of perception which have been developed through not only 10,000 years of ancestry, but also 100s of millions years of life itself, well below our species. All of this is inherited, in a way, in "memory", the form of the matter of which we are made. When "memory" is acting, this by default is read as "natural". If someone fakes a punch and we flinch...this is natural. It is speaking from our memory. It flows, seemingly, without thought. But Thailand's Muay Thai has a concept of developed naturalness, which is to say the qualities of physical expression which also can flow with the ease that memory has. The temptation is to create "new memories" (that's why "muscle memory") is a thing. If we can train and cram-down memories back into our causal shoot, far enough in, then they too might come out some what "natural" in the future. You see a great deal of this in the proliferation of the "combo", a fixed pattern of strike that is trained over and over again, trying to force it back down into the causal chain, so it can come out "natural"...though it almost always, when trained like this, comes out "forced" and far from Thai Tammachat. The reason for this failing is identified in the passages below (though, this is just a note, and the passages themselves may be hard to decipher, I'm drawing out a line of their thought). The point or idea is not to create new memory, or new instincts (they will never be as strong as those inherited by the instincts of biology, or of those learned deep in our forgettable pasts), its to put Instinct itself in relationship with Thought (or, in the text Intelligence). The ideal state, the Tammachat state, is one in which Instinct and Thought alternate and affect each other. Not only does Thought shape Instinct, Instinct shapes Thought. In some sense the great history of our Being, our personal Unconscious (all things experienced, most of it well below our threshold of awareness) and our collective biological Instincts, all the causes of how we act, is placed in communication with Thoughts, Intelligence, Ideas, in the sense that there is dialogue and mutuality, and no priority of either. In "flow states", presumability, this communication becomes utterly suffused. This is why "play" plays such an important part of Thai training and development, it approximates in a low stakes way this suffusion. Aesthetics and Thought The role of Intensification. In the philosophy of Deleuze (and Deleuze and Guattari) there is emphasis on speeds. The exposure to speeds (sometimes in an absolute sense, sometimes in terms of changes in speeds) produces an intensification within oneself. Something that is too fast, but also something that is too slow...intensifies. In this framework I'll position this as that-which-challenges-thought, or that-which-is-where-thought-cannot-follow. This is to say, using Intelligence to keep track, plan and react is no longer sufficient. Intensification is what puts Thought in relationship with Instinct. (And keep in mind, here Instinct isn't just animal reactiviness, though it includes that too. It is the sum of our Unconscious causations.) Intensifications produce a dialogue. Muay Thai active training, aside from drills and conditioning, is thought of as "getting used to" certain speeds and intensifications, things that would just throw you into pure instinctive reactions if you were untrained. But, it is much more than that. The "getting used to" is not just exposure therapy, it is actually putting Thought and Instinct into communication with each other, by degrees. You want both dimensions, otherwise you will never receive Tammachat. This is how Thai aesthetics - to which a non-Thai must submit and be shaped by - work to sew together these two aspects of our Being. The over-arching picture of what the art of Muay Thai is, is what allows the space in which Instinct and Thought can develop together in unanticipated, experimental ways. Each must shape each...within the Aesthetic, held together by the Aesthetic. The use of intensification - there are many aspects of intensification, but we can stay with solely the quality of speeds - is to unseat Thought and place it into community with Instinct (your Past). If the intensification is too strong Thought will be forced completely down into Instinct, too light and it will operate over Instinct. The key to Tammachat is that they suffuse, the "wisdom" of each in combination. This is why Thailand's traditional Muay Thai, its very high level of command over the fight space, is an art. Fighters develop within a sphere of progressive, integrating, creative intensifications, and the fight is conducted at the level of a Tammachat suffusion of Thought and Instinct. This is what the great legendary fighters of Thailand's past exude an extraordinary degree of being "at ease", which is why they are so "natural" in their speeds and relations. One is not simply "getting used to" speeds and intensifications. Your Past (the full causal panoply of what you are, reaching much further back than even your person, into what you are as an organism) is being synthesized into an Aesthetic, a certain kind of creative completion, or some variation thereof.                                  
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    • The first fight between Poot Lorlek and Posai Sittiboonlert was recently uploaded to youtube. Posai is one of the earliest great Muay Khao fighters and influential to Dieselnoi, but there's very little footage of him. Poot is one of the GOATs and one of Posai's best wins, it's really cool to see how Posai's style looked against another elite fighter.
    • Yeah, this is certainly possible. Thanks! I just like the idea of a training camp pre-fight because of focus and getting more "locked in".. Do you know of any high level gyms in europe you would recommend? 
    • You could just pick a high-level gym in a European city, just live and train there for however long you want (a month?). Lots of gyms have morning and evening classes.
    • Hi, i have a general question concerning Muay-Thai training camps, are there any serious ones in Europe at all? I know there are some for kickboxing in the Netherlands, but that's not interesting to me or what i aim for. I have found some regarding Muay-Thai in google searches, but what iv'e found seem to be only "retreats" with Muay-Thai on a level compareable to fitness-boxing, yoga or mindfullness.. So what i look for, but can't seem to find anywhere, are camps similar to those in Thailand. Grueling, high-intensity workouts with trainers who have actually fought and don't just do this as a hobby/fitness regime. A place where you can actually grow, improve technique and build strength and gas-tank with high intensity, not a vacation... No hate whatsoever to those who do fitness-boxing and attend retreats like these, i just find it VERY ODD that there ain't any training camps like those in Thailand out there, or perhaps i haven't looked good enough?..  Appericiate all responses, thank you! 
    • In my experience, 1 pair of gloves is fine (14oz in my case, so I can spar safely), just air them out between training (bag gloves definitely not necessary). Shinguards are a good idea, though gyms will always have them and lend them out- just more hygienic to have your own.  2 pairs of wraps, 2 shorts (I like the lightweight Raja ones for the heat), 1 pair of good road running trainers. Good gumshield and groin-protector, naturally. Every time I finish training, I bring everything into the shower (not gloves or shinnies, obviously) with me to clean off the (bucketsfull in my case) of sweat, but things dry off quickly here outside of the monsoon season.  One thing I have found I like is smallish, cotton briefs for training (less cloth, therefore sweaty wetness than boxers, etc.- bring underwear from home- decent, cotton stuff is strangely expensive here). Don't weigh yourself down too much. You might want to buy shorts or vests from the gym(s) as (useful) souvenirs. I recommend Action Zone and Keelapan, next door, in Bangkok (good selection and prices):  https://www.google.com/maps/place/Action+Zone/@13.7474264,100.5206774,17z/data=!4m14!1m7!3m6!1s0x30e29931ee397e41:0x4c8f06926c37408b!2sAction+Zone!8m2!3d13.7474212!4d100.5232523!16s%2Fg%2F1hm3_f5d2!3m5!1s0x30e29931ee397e41:0x4c8f06926c37408b!8m2!3d13.7474212!4d100.5232523!16s%2Fg%2F1hm3_f5d2?entry=ttu&g_ep=EgoyMDI0MTAyOS4wIKXMDSoASAFQAw%3D%3D
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