Muay Thai: Combat Conditioning Bsasic

Muay Thai (also known as Thai Boxing) is a form of kickboxing originating in Thailand and Southeast Asia. This discipline uses the fists, feet, shins, and elbows to strike the opponent. Thai Boxing is a powerful and potentially dangerous sport that requires a lot of training to be done well. Muay Thai training encourages not only skill and technique, but endurance, speed, strength, timing, and all-around toughness.

Training for this combat sport involves a lot of time spent working on proper technique while hitting focus mitts, thai pads, and heavy bags. Fighters can work on the timing of their attacks, counter-attacks, and foot work using the focus mitts. Fighters usually use heavy bags for heavier resistance training to gain power. Much like boxing, training can also involve shadowboxing to reinforce proper technique and speed or live sparring to simulate a real fight or competition.

To have a fully conditioned body, Thai Boxing training integrates other conditioning exercises found in other sports, like bodyweight exercises such as sit-ups, pull-ups, and push-ups. Fighters may also cross-train with jumping rope, long distance running, and sprinting. Like other boxing, Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu and MMA fighters, Muay Thai fighters may also lift weights in addition to body-weight exercises.

Muay Thai fighters usually spend time conditioning their shins for impacts during fight. Fighters attempt to thicken the shin bone by kicking things like heavy bags wrapped in rope. To aid in the bone thickening, fighters supplement their diets with calcium and vitamin D or rub special oils on the skin of their legs. Some fighters, during Muay Thai training, condition the shins by dulling the nerve endings surrounding the bone by repetitively impacting and rubbing the bone with objects such as glass bottles.

There are many ways to begin your training in Muay Thai, the best of which is to find a school located nearby. Most major cities have Muay Thai St Louis, New York, Miami, Milwaukee, and Los Angeles included. Other resources include Muay Thai DVDs and books.