Self training Lethwei!

no it was Muay Thai California event.
You know what I'm wondering, are there lot of sanctioned events in Cali? I've competed in the states as well as teammates of mine, but I barely see people there from cali. If there's lots of events locally, it makes sense why they wouldn't have to travel to compete.
 
You know what I'm wondering, are there lot of sanctioned events in Cali? I've competed in the states as well as teammates of mine, but I barely see people there from cali. If there's lots of events locally, it makes sense why they wouldn't have to travel to compete.

socal is the muay thai hotspot of the US. the only things worth traveling for imo would be the tournament in iowa and washington. Plus vegas is not far away where the majority of the pro bouts are held in the US. Siam Fight productions is in Arizona, thats not too far and a good promotion as well. Triumphant is new on the scene, most their stuff is in the Bay, i was going to fight on that show in Feb but i have had some setbacks.
 
Interesting thread, I always found Lethwei fascinating too, and actually had the chance to exchange and learn more about it from some Burmese guys in Koh Phagnan (Thailand) who trained it in their youth and still very much followed the sport and its fighters.

... so I finally watched a Lethwei fight and now I'm hooked. I love how fundamentally similar it is to kard chuek muay thai, to the point of being identical save for headbutts. I immediately knew that I wanted to give it a try because it's just a matter of adding headbutts and learning a few new clinching techniques.

I get what you mean - but the thing is that if you remove the headbutts - you're just doing muay thai, so you may as well just train Thai Boxing haha.

Train MT, add headbutts, boom lethwei.

Lethwei is actually quite different to Muay Thai. The two are quite comparable in terms of training methods (cardio, conditioning, equipment etc.) and the kicks and knees are pretty much identical however the focus of the fight and strategical and technical aspects are very different especially as there is no gloves and because while Muay Thai focuses a lot on kicks, knees and clinching because of how it's scored especially in Thailand, Lethwei has a lot more focus on punches and headbutts and is fought a lot more aggressively with chains of strikes / combos rather than the typical stand and trade approach of Muay Thai. It's mostly due to the fact that there is no scoring / judges' decision and the only objective is to KO your opponent.

The no glove element means that you don't learn how to block with gloves and a lot of strikes that wouldn't necessarily go through with gloves do go through without them.

This makes Lethwei a lot more like a street brawl.

Muay Thai fighters tend to be superior technically while Lethwei fighters tend to be a lot more "tough" and aggressive. Interestingly enough some Muay Thai fighters who competed in Lethwei had quite a bit of success and there are also Lethwei fighters who transitioned to Muay Thai and have done quite well too. There's a famous Lethwei fighter currently fighting in Lumpini but I forgot his name, I'll have to ask my Burmese friend his name again.

He's told me before that while he wouldn't mind fighting in Muay Thai again, he definitely wouldn't fight in Lethwei again because of how much more violent and dangerous it is. He's seen several people die in Lethwei during or right after the fights.

Anyway, watching some Lethwei fights a couple of years ago made me realize that Lethwei can be excellent for a street fight.

Well you're right as Lethwei is very similar to a street fight because of the headbutts, no gloves and no points or judges, and the "finish or be finished" approach to the fight :)
 
Interesting thread, I always found Lethwei fascinating too, and actually had the chance to exchange and learn more about it from some Burmese guys in Koh Phagnan (Thailand) who trained it in their youth and still very much followed the sport and its fighters.







Lethwei is actually quite different to Muay Thai. The two are quite comparable in terms of training methods (cardio, conditioning, equipment etc.) and the kicks and knees are pretty much identical however the focus of the fight and strategical and technical aspects are very different especially as there is no gloves and because while Muay Thai focuses a lot on kicks, knees and clinching because of how it's scored especially in Thailand, Lethwei has a lot more focus on punches and headbutts and is fought a lot more aggressively with chains of strikes / combos rather than the typical stand and trade approach of Muay Thai. It's mostly due to the fact that there is no scoring / judges' decision and the only objective is to KO your opponent.

The no glove element means that you don't learn how to block with gloves and a lot of strikes that wouldn't necessarily go through with gloves do go through without them.

This makes Lethwei a lot more like a street brawl.

Muay Thai fighters tend to be superior technically while Lethwei fighters tend to be a lot more "tough" and aggressive. Interestingly enough some Muay Thai fighters who competed in Lethwei had quite a bit of success and there are also Lethwei fighters who transitioned to Muay Thai and have done quite well too. There's a famous Lethwei fighter currently fighting in Lumpini but I forgot his name, I'll have to ask my Burmese friend his name again.

He's told me before that while he wouldn't mind fighting in Muay Thai again, he definitely wouldn't fight in Lethwei again because of how much more violent and dangerous it is. He's seen several people die in Lethwei during or right after the fights.



Well you're right as Lethwei is very similar to a street fight because of the headbutts, no gloves and no points or judges, and the "finish or be finished" approach to the fight :)

Oh yeah I know about that stuff - I just did an article for Muay Thai Guy on Lethwei where I did quite a bit of research.

I'm talking more in the technical approach to form rather than the strategic approach - but that does make sense because when it comes down to it all of those indochinese martial arts are essentially the same thing with just slightly different ring sports and scoring systems (they're essentially all Bokator).



I actually quite like the bull guard that Lethwei uses where you clang the punches off of your forearms, I think that's a surprisingly effective means of defence. Really cool that you know a guy that fought under those rules. I like the idea of doing it - but I doubt I ever would be man enough :p
 
Oh yeah I know about that stuff - I just did an article for Muay Thai Guy on Lethwei where I did quite a bit of research.

I'm talking more in the technical approach to form rather than the strategic approach - but that does make sense because when it comes down to it all of those indochinese martial arts are essentially the same thing with just slightly different ring sports and scoring systems (they're essentially all Bokator).



I actually quite like the bull guard that Lethwei uses where you clang the punches off of your forearms, I think that's a surprisingly effective means of defence. Really cool that you know a guy that fought under those rules. I like the idea of doing it - but I doubt I ever would be man enough :p


bokator is a cambodian martial art, the guys in that video are speaking khmer. KunKhmer vs Bokator is kinda like MT vs Muay Boran. However they do fight bokator, but the skill level in its current state is not very high (probably due to the genocide), they also do quite a bit of dancing around in it, and on some of the bokator fights the floor is very wet and slippery like they are fighting on a slip n slide lol. Cambodian new year is this weekend, ill try to record a bokator demonstration if they do one, last year my friend and I did kunkhmer demo.



here they are slippery floor fighting, this vids not too bad, in some of them they are litterally fighting in puddles and you can see water splashing all over the place.



compare that to kun khmer



and lastly cambodian fighters are regularly fighting against thais both in thailand and cambodia and they are fighting on cards like max muay thai and thai fight, but many people dont notice because they cant tell the difference.

 
bokator is a cambodian martial art, the guys in that video are speaking khmer. KunKhmer vs Bokator is kinda like MT vs Muay Boran. However they do fight bokator, but the skill level in its current state is not very high (probably due to the genocide), they also do quite a bit of dancing around in it, and on some of the bokator fights the floor is very wet and slippery like they are fighting on a slip n slide lol. Cambodian new year is this weekend, ill try to record a bokator demonstration if they do one, last year my friend and I did kunkhmer demo.



here they are slippery floor fighting, this vids not too bad, in some of them they are litterally fighting in puddles and you can see water splashing all over the place.



compare that to kun khmer



and lastly cambodian fighters are regularly fighting against thais both in thailand and cambodia and they are fighting on cards like max muay thai and thai fight, but many people dont notice because they cant tell the difference.



It's really interesting - because it all seems to date back to the Khmer Empire - that covered all of them - it seems that bokator is the father art that developed into muay boran, or was at the very least renamed it
 
It's really interesting - because it all seems to date back to the Khmer Empire - that covered all of them - it seems that bokator is the father art that developed into muay boran, or was at the very least renamed it

i agree.

yeah the whole argument of who invented muay thai between the thais and khmers is kinda silly, it would be like someone arguing over who invented punching....meaning theres only so many things the human body can do by the way its designed so bokator and muay boran and kun khmer and muay thai are all basically the same more or less........but you will still have different gyms or camps who specialize in things. maybe another analogy could be muay thai vs australian muay thai for example.
 
i agree.

yeah the whole argument of who invented muay thai between the thais and khmers is kinda silly, it would be like someone arguing over who invented punching....meaning theres only so many things the human body can do by the way its designed so bokator and muay boran and kun khmer and muay thai are all basically the same more or less........but you will still have different gyms or camps who specialize in things. maybe another analogy could be muay thai vs australian muay thai for example.
Let them bang
 
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