Journaling - Readings, Muay Thai, Concepts and Articulations

[Kevin von Duuglas-Ittu]

Muay As Hieroglyphics

The relationship is to the muay, not to any particular opponent, or achievement, belt. Those things help you create and nurture the relationship to the muay, and that means ultimately to yourself. In the muay you see yourself sculpted out against Time, in the spirit of emotion, with your body, like a stylus that has been writing in hieroglyphics your whole life.

[Kevin von Duuglas-Ittu]

Muay Thai is not a commodity, it is a way of Life.

[Kevin von Duuglas-Ittu]

"Progressive" Training in Thailand

Just heard about a name Thai gym's training style described as progressive. Westerners are the worst Muay Thai fighters in the world...let's train like them. smh.

 

On a deeper level, this may be the future of the sport, because the deep-learning training of Thailand's Muay Thai, how it got such excellence out of its fighters, came out of its culture, its sub-culture...which is changing/eroding. More and more those training conditions will not be available, and the lure of modernity (which doesn't actually produce fluent fighters), will always be there to fill in the increasing gap.

Unfortunately, this also ties into the very old place Western (and globalizing) culture - its "civilizing progress" ideology - has had in Thai consciousness. If it has blinking lights, its good.

[Kevin von Duuglas-Ittu]

The Enjoyment of Festival Fights

https://www.facebook.com/watch/live/?ref=watch_permalink&v=942850751079497

So enjoying this Udon festival fight stream, found via Egokind (https://x.com/Egokind1)

This is the real of Muay Thai. Hell, the last fight with kids was pulling 6K viewers in the stream, while RWS was pulling 2K. There was a Japanese fighter earlier (guessing from appearances), maybe big-for-his-age 12, or maybe 14, who gave it his all as the Thai illegal tripped him endlessly, such a very real experience for him. Just hearing the crowd of gamblers and community shout on every strike, even the local commercials, this is just beautiful stuff. Hard to explain how satisfying it is when it its not just a "show" for tourists.

I say this, as two...maybe "influencers"?? (who don't have much Muay Thai, or once had Muay Thai, but now seem to have have quite a bit of animosity), go hard at each other in the ring, right now. There is a difference between a "show" that is a commercial product, and what I would call Thai spectacle. Spectacle is understood as unreal (thus, "does not count", un-significant). Thailand's Muay Thai, in its cultural fabric, can weave the spectacle and the real, together...which is why Entertainment Muay Thai, as a tv phenomena in Thailand, was so hard to read. It was completely unreal...spectacle (Thai Fight & MAX in those days)...but then it started making claims of the real, even the "most real".

In festival fights like these you can get an entire spectrum of Muay Thai, in all its shades and colors, from spectacle to the very real. Kids on the come up, Old Men, rising stars, big side-bet fights. It's like a fair of Muay Thai.

The most wonderful is that you get the full ruleset in the provinces, including repeated and continuous clinch fighting, and very strong aesthetic sense of narrative in scoring. Everyone understands stories are being told, and they are being told at all distances, in a full range of skills, even among the less skilled. It is the spoken story of bodies.

[Kevin von Duuglas-Ittu]

 

A Big KO Win for Sylvie's Past Opponent Hongthong

Geez, that was completely unexpected. Thought Diandra Martin would kind of walk through Hongthong tonight on RWS, but instead a very sharp KO on a 1-2 from Hongtong. Hongtong looked at a size disadvantage even, and Martin had beaten Amber Kitchen on ONE (looking it up).

Our interest in this fight was Sylvie has fought Hongthong 4 times herself giving up huge weight (about 22 lbs), and we almost always are pulling for her ex-opponents (nothing against Diandra, we just don't know her). We know Hongthong and her gym, her gymmates, and her coach well.

This is a huge win for Hongthong who has been fighting Muay Thai for long time.

I also suspect that Diandra wasn't well served by fighting a patient, "Thai Style" fight. When Hongthong can reset, reset, reset she's on much more comfortable ground.

 

[Kevin von Duuglas-Ittu]

On 11/23/2024 at 8:59 PM, Kevin von Duuglas-Ittu said:

There is a difference between a "show" that is a commercial product, and what I would call Thai spectacle. Spectacle is understood as unreal (thus, "does not count", un-significant). Thailand's Muay Thai, in its cultural fabric, can weave the spectacle and the real, together

Fake, Real & Spectacle in Thailand

I say unreal, but in another sense there is a reality to spectacle, almost an alternate enjoyment enjoyment that includes all sorts of values, but...it does not count. It is not added to that register of counting and measurement. This, I suspect, also helps explain thrown fights in even Bangkok stadium Muay Thai. When a fight is thrown, even though many will be upset, there is an additional sense of "I see what happened there, this wasn't real". The fight then slips into spectacle. This "counts" vs "spectacle" in Thailand doesn't quite match up with Western concepts of sport, where things are just real or fake, with strong judicial codification. This is one of the complexities in trying to produce "Entertainment" (Spectacle) versions of the sport/art, that are regarded as the "most real".

[Kevin von Duuglas-Ittu]

16 hours ago, Kevin von Duuglas-Ittu said:

I say this, as two...maybe "influencers"?? (who don't have much Muay Thai, or once had Muay Thai, but now seem to have have quite a bit of animosity), go hard at each other in the ring, right now.

This caption (below) says "Honestly, this fight was more exciting than ONE", from Remina's page

https://www.facebook.com/watch/?v=3793175460900201&rdid=anii3llwrR2LSV4j

[Kevin von Duuglas-Ittu]

Clinch Devolving

Channel 7. Muay Thai has gotten into a very bad habit of when there is a lead the ref just breaks clinch the moment it gets to the rope. This leads to just a fighter chasing to the rope, and then break, over and over and over and over. If refs would just let these positions on the rope cook for a bit, they'd start to degrade, and the fighter with the lead would have to do more than just wait for the ref.

Main event today. An early count just led to endless ref breaks.

Let clinch breathe. It builds skills, narrative.

[Kevin von Duuglas-Ittu]

This was good on Reddit a few years ago:

 

The Game Logic of the Danced Off 5th Round in Thailand's Muay Thai

I was having a great conversation with Sylvie about the nature of Thailand's Muay Thai this morning, and why when you have the lead in the fight, traditionally, you begin to retreat and defend that lead, instead of marching forward and adding more pressure. You ostensibly "perform your lead" by taking defensive tactics, which to many parts of the world looks like the opposite of "fighting". In a comment on Reddit I was trying to explain this phenomena through how someone like Usain Bolt will ease up and coast into the last 15 meters, in a kind of dominance while everyone else is burning hard, because of a kind of excess, "I don't even have to punch it to beat you". This is a big part of the Muay Thai aesethetic. You can read that comment here: https://www.reddit.com/r/MuayThai/comments/pxtv2x/i_think_people_do_not_understand_how_thailands/hesx7fs/?utm_source=reddit&utm_medium=web2x&context=3

The reason for this is that Thailand's Muay Thai is about dominance, not aggression. Aggression can be a tool toward dominance, but it's only one tool in the tool box. A lot of this stems from the fact that Thailand's Muay Thai evolved to express a Buddhistic culture (and a reason why I'd argue that turning MT promotions into hyper-aggressive shows can contain a hidden cultural betrayal), but as you can see from the Usain Bolt analogy, in the West we can understand this kind of "ease into the tape" signature of superiority. Even in Western boxing we can admire the artful boxer who just toys with his opponent's aggression with an artful jab, evasiveness or movement (think Ali or Mayweather), its not all that far from parts of our own sports values.

It's enough to say this led to a really interesting analogy Sylvie gave me regarding the much derided 5th round dance off in Thailand's Muay Thai. Let's say right off there are admittedly big problems with the 5th round dance off. It's safe to say that it is an aspect of Muay Thai that has become distorted and exaggerated, and not only produces unexciting ends to fights, its become the signature of big name gambling's powerful influence in the sport. This post is really about the underlying logic of the dance off, and besides its current flaws, what positive values it is expressing, helping explain how it is also viewed. Why do two fighters dance off the 5th round at times? Why does a fighter who is behind not keep trying, keep fighting?! When one fighter is signaling an insurmountable lead, why isn't the other fighter "heroically" relentless in pursuit?

Chess Gives A Clue

Sylvie's analogy comes from Chess. In Thailand's Muay Thai there is a definite "Gentleman's Sport" ethic that works to compliment it's absolute violence, so Chess is an interesting parallel. She said to me: In chess once you've gotten to the place in the game where you know by sheer logic you are going to lose you tip your own King over and resign. Masters will resign in positions that casual viewers might not even understand. There are a lot of pieces on the board! What a player is doing when they resign is showing their IQ for the game. If you continue fighting to win from unwinnable positions you can be signaling your inability to even see the board. Yes, your opponent may make an unexpected blunder. Yes, there might be buried in the position of some improbable ability to leverage a draw, but largely what is happening is that you are placing yourself ABOVE this particular game. If you struggled forward, not really realizing your fate, your would be signaling to your audience and your opponent you lack understanding. You can't see. This keys into deeper Thai cultural views that regard sheer aggression as low IQ and somewhat animalistic (non-human). You don't understand Chess.

Now, there are all kinds of Chess players, and some of them may become famous for fighting out of bad positions and stealing draws. This isn't to describe what one should do, it's to explain the logic of why a losing fighter would choose to dance off. They acknowledge the board position, they are above this particular match/game. Thai fighters fight a LOT of fights. The tournament of a career is composed of many games.

Now, once you get the logic you can also see where the problems are. If there are TOO many sprinters coasting into the tape. If there are TOO many fighters touching gloves in the 5th round, the "board" of the game is being influenced by something (or the match making is very poor). In these cases its explained that the chess board of the fight, the position that fighters are responding to, involves the heavy thumb of powerful gamblers. You touch gloves not only because of the "position" of how the fight was fought, but also understanding the powers that shape the fight as well. You can see that the lead in front of you is of a type that you would look stupid if you fought against it. You would look like you didn't understand the game and how it is won.

How the 5th round is fought has changed over the decades, to be sure. It has stretched too far into a direction, but the logic of the danced round remains the same, that of the Chess match.

Taking Ideology Into Context Too

I also think that there are cultural elements that make this hard to read from a Western perspective. In the West we have a big celebration of the Little Guy. In the mythology of the West we have the story of the insignificant man who through "hard work" overcomes all odds against him. There is not only great romance over this ideological story, fighting itself has been an entertainment form that expresses this romance. We see this in the entire Rocky Balboa Working Man franchise. For us a lot of fighting is about this. I do think these stories resonate with Thai storytelling. Great fighters of the past who became champions out of rural provinces, fighters like Samson Isaan (who literally took the name of Isaan), do represent a kind of working class, provincial victory against all odds, but this is in the context of a much less socially mobile society, than say America. The much older cultural stories of Thailand are ones of hierarchy, and layered, group-bound peoples. Part of the "checkmate in waiting" acceptance is probably best understood in this wider lack of mobility, a lack of a more highly Individualistic Self-Destiny mythology (which contains its own social ills). In "seeing the mate" in advance you to some degree transcend your situation by demonstrating that you understand it, you see the position on the board from above, you have that IQ...but you are also trapped by it, you accept THIS loss, in the name of having perhaps a better chance to win the next time.

This isn't to say that dancing off the 5th round is the right thing to do, in any particular fight, or even to say that the practice of the 5th round in today's Muay Thai doesn't need to substantively change, it does. But it's to explain the logic of it. Today's Muay Thai in Thailand is trying to take the big name Gambler's thumb off the scale, not an easy task because gambling itself is woven into the seriousness of matches, a fighter's identity, and the passion for Muay Thai itself. It's instead to try and explain the nature of some of the thinking that is beneath a 5th round performance. It is not just fighters taking a break "because they fight so much". It's locating yourself, positioning yourself socially in the game, a game you are ultimately trying to win.

If interested in my thoughts on what I believe underlies Thailand's Muay Thai can see my article on the "6 Core Aspects" https://8limbsus.com/muay-thai-thailand/essence-muay-thai-6-core-aspects-makes

[Kevin von Duuglas-Ittu]

Fighting Big

It's crazy, just looking at Smilla's record, a very fine fighter and possibly this gen's best fighter (?). Of the 17 documented fights, Sylvie has fought TWO of Smilla's opponents (Pornpan & Nongbiew, 1-1), and also 2 high profile opponents of her opponents (Dongkongfah - who beat Alycia Rodrigues for the Thailand belt  & Hongthong who beat Diandra Martin on RWS). Smilla is a 125 lb fighter, Sylvie a 100 lb fighter. One of these was a ways a back, so Smilla, who I love as a fighter, wasn't as big probably....but it goes to show that Sylvie has fought pretty much more than a full generation of Thai female fighters, across all weight classes.

And Sylvie is 4-3 against them.

[Kevin von Duuglas-Ittu]

Sylvie Prolific Fighting

counted it up just now, Sylvie is 4 opponents away from having faced 150 Thais in the ring. Unheard of fighting in Thailand.

[Kevin von Duuglas-Ittu]

How to Judge a Long Term Muay Thai Gym in Thailand

A perspective of Muay Thai gyms in Thailand, from someone who has seen a few (usually with an eye towards: would this be a good place to train for Sylvie?) I've already written at length on the Authenticity of Muay Thai gyms, this is something else. This is something else. It's just a basic conception we've relied on in judging gyms. I see them something like production lines in a factory, maybe like a cupcake factory.

This is not to say that the workings of a Muay Thai gym in Thailand are mechanistic, but rather that the dynamics of the gym may be occluded from view.

You have all these gears and mechanisms, many of them you might not even understand or appreciate. Ways of training, reputation, social hierarchies & politics in the gym, the personality of the owner, fight promotion alliances, its a whole living thing in Thailand. But, what you want to look at...what I look at, is "what does it produce?" What cupcakes come down the conveyor belt? That's what the whole process is doing.

Now, this is a little complicated in Thailand because in terms of Thais bigger name gyms actually buy their cupcakes already made. They buy them baked. They might put them through an additional process, develop them some, but mostly they were made elsewhere, by other processes. As someone coming long term to Thailand you really want to get into the deeper processes themselves, which may not be where big name fighters are. There could be very good training around big name fighters, but it isn't likely developmental training, the thing that makes the cupcakes. For that you need to see Thai kids and teens.

On another level though, many gyms have long term Westerners (and others). Pay less attention to the supposed training and trying to judge that from afar, and more paying attention to the way farang fight that have gone through that process over time. See what foreign cupcakes are coming down the conveyor belt. What do they fight like in the ring? What skills or styles do they show? Look for the kinds of cupcakes being made that you want to be like. Long-term farang usually settle into a training culture of their own in a gym, and may be even more important than the training prescription itself when it comes down to what the gym is going to make of you, because one is always taking cues from those to the left and right of you. It's one of the beautiful things about Thailand. Things like: how fast do you wrap your hands, how much do you chit-chat, do you do full rounds on the pads, do you do shadowboxing, or finish the run will be shaped by your co-fighters (students). I remember in our first year of Lanna 30 minute hand wrapping in the morning was kind of a thing, a thing Sylvie had to consciously fight against, because its was the gym tempo.

Gyms might have reputations, good or bad, but look at what they actually make. That way you can align your desires to commitment. I want to undergo that. And...if the kinds of fighters coming out of a gym, made by that gym, both Thai and farang, aren't the kind of things you like, perhaps move away from that gym, because if you undergo those processes you too will look like that, those cupcakes.

This isn't to criticize gyms, there are all kinds of cupcakes. This is actually one of our ways of thinking about gyms, for Sylvie (and sometimes others). To see the value of the forces that are at play, see what they do, and think: do I want some of that?

 

Now for Sylvie who is intensely experienced (and pretty much fluent in Thai), and who has unusual requirements in Thailand (her size, her desire to be near Thai culture & training ethics, some freedom from Thai politics), things are a bit more complex. We think about this in layers. We look at gyms and see what cupcakes they make, and take from that a certain education about what the processes will do to you. Sometimes the cupcakes that are coming out of a gym might not be all that awesome, in terms of what you want to be, but you can still learn valuably from what is produced. Sometimes you can be: I want to train at this gym for this reason, or that (but I have to be careful because I don't want to be turned into that kind of fighter, the kind that this gym's processes tend to produce). With this you can ward off, or look for those things that make that kind of fighter, or...take precautions to look for these things in oneself. A great deal of training in a gym is unconscious. You become shaped by people training beside you, for better or worse. That's why the cupcake example is important. You don't necessarily have to identity what is producing quality x or y...you just have to be aware that this is what tends to happen.

Sometimes its as simple as: This gym produces lazy fighters, this gym produces very tough fighters. Even broadbrush things like this come out of the culture of a gym and its practices. The way that authority and values are exercised, the aesthetics of its muay. This alone might be a reason to train at a gym, or avoid one. The vibe is contagious, and shaping, even if you are experienced. For Sylvie she build-a-bear's her training, from different gyms, and private training, because its hard to find a gym that has "everything" so to speak. You look at certain things different gyms do well, and try to weave them. This though, is incredibly difficult in Thailand politically, and isn't advised. I mention it only to expand on the cupcake factory idea, that gyms can tend to produce qualities, qualities that draw your eye.

To return to more regular examples, if you are drawn to technical training don't just think about whether there is correction in training. Look at how long term farang fighters fight, coming out of that gym. If you are looking for Muay Khao training, do the long term farang from that gym fight as strong Muay Khao and clinch fighters? Look at Instagram and Facebook pages and watch some fights, if you are researching seriously.

Off the top of my head if you want an example from female fighting I'd take a look at Alycia and Barbara at Phuket Fight Club, something I've thought about. I haven't a clue what their training is like, and I really don't care that they are on big name promotions. If you look at the two fighters you can see what they train. They are both intensely driven, have sound principles, fight within themselves (what they know they do well), have a core, effective forward style, are tough minded with a technical dimension and are open to clinch. There are many important things that could probably be said in much more detail by people in the ground, but you can see what the gym has made, its processes. Jalill Barnes who also trains there, much of the same qualities. I'm not even recommending the gym (I don't know much about it), I'm just using the example to show how you can see the process in fighters. I don't mean to single it out, but I needed an example to keep the whole thing from being too abstract.

It's not that everyone fights the same, or even that a gym has a style (some might). It's that certain qualities get disseminated through the process of training, and a gym's support or allowance of those qualities. Sometimes this is expressed in style, sometimes in other things. But, largely when positive qualities show themselves, things you are looking for, this is a good thing. It means that there is a consistent way.

 

[Kevin von Duuglas-Ittu]

Sylvie's Elitely Difficult Fight Record

Just organizing Sylvie's record a little bit this morning, and noting this. It may very well be that no female Muay Thai fighter has fought a tougher collection of opponents than Sylvie has in the 39 fights. These are all her opponents who have been World Champion at one point in their career, and Sylvie's record against them. What is unparalleled, I believe, isn't the sheer number of World Champion quality of fighters, but also how many times she went up in weight to face them, including jumps of multiple weight classes. Weight is the single most determining factor of fight match up fairness, whereas Sylvie has consistently fought much higher than her weight even against elite level fighters. I can't think of a fighter who has done this.

 

 

[Kevin von Duuglas-Ittu]

Muay Thai Rules

The commercial generalization of a diverse art and sport into codified rules (legalization), is not entirely unlike AI generalizing living language into patterns...without actually understanding language. It moves from the specifically general, to the generally specific, via algorithm. This is to say that the specificity of a verdant expression, a concratized variety, then becomes refined as a specific generalization (a governing rule, laws), for the purposes of export, rules/laws not really involved in the generation of the concretized variety itself.

Relevant graphic:

 

[Kevin von Duuglas-Ittu]

I feel like I've kind of resigned myself to realizing that I lived through the last of maybe classical Muay Thai, the Muay Thai of Rama IX, and it is just passing into another phase. Maybe it will bend back at some point, the country is incredibly resilient to foreign influence (though very open to it, as if it has developed an immunity over the centuries through that contact and impulse). I feel maybe less like we have to struggle to pull it all back into the other direction, away from its commodification, and more that I'm just so joyed to have experienced its final decade, to have seen it, and be living in that afterglow. I still hope to preserve as much from those final generations, hoping the seeds of that beautiful art are thrown forward...but at least today I'm more in a state of appreciation and thankfulness.

[Kevin von Duuglas-Ittu]

The World Broken up into its Muay Thai and BJJ parts: