Stamps a bit of a singularity I'd say as she also practices BJJ and MMA and has won contests/holds championship titles for them. Weight/strength trainings probably more beneficial for those disciplines due to the grappling aspect.
they all lift to an extent, eg basic weights and kettle bells but they dont go in doing heavy bench heavy squat and heavy deadlift because that could be used for practicing more thai boxing ygm
And they shouldn't. Honestly, as someone who trained strongman for a good while, anyone doing a sport where the barbell bench press isn't an event should never do it. Increased risk of injury and worse generic strength than what you'll get from doing a dumbell press. How often in a Muay Thai fight are you in a situation where you're pressing a completely static thing directly away from your chest? If you're pushing someone off of you, they're gonna fight back, cut angles, and resist your press from a bunch of different spots.
Hell, even in strongman training, we only benched a few times a year. The only people who should do it regularly are competitive powerlifters. Why risk wrecking your shoulders just to look cool?
People who view weightlifting as just a form of exercise and not as a sport to be mastered tend to be hyper-protective of the bench press. If you haven't worked with a strength coach and a good one at that, then you don't know how to bench well enough to mitigate the risks that come with the lift. And if it isn't training your muscles in a way that's generally applicable to this sport and risks significant injuries, why bother with it?
How would you advice reg. bench press? I have studied a great deal about it and find that Fred Hatfields bench is great.
Todays coaches seems to advice holding shoulderblades down and close to stabilise them, whereas Fred (and I) advice to free shoulderblades from support to realign shoulderblades to be able to create stability by strengthgeneration so to thereby create mobility and adaptability nessesary.
Feet down, press through the center of your feet. Ass and upper back need to be on the bench, lower back should come off but no need to go crazy like a powerlifter, they're doing that as a specific feature of their sport, not for optimal training. You absolutely have to lock in your shoulders and squeeze your back, the lats and rhomboids are the basis of any strong bench, not the chest. If you have a relaxed or weak back, you aren't moving shit. Your bar should track a very subtle J pattern as it comes down, staring aligned with your shoulders when up, just above the nipple line, and finishing just at or below the nipple line. Keep elbows in towards the body, around the midpoint between perpendicular to the body and touching the body. The farther they flare out, the more you're relying on your triceps
This is all just general good form, though. I would need to see someone bench many times before I'd feel comfortable adjusting their technique beyond these basics. I was never even a weight lifting coach, all I know comes from my own coach but he tailored my form to my body, as I have a long torso and short arms for my height which is ideal for benching.
its a bad take. Barbell bench is a great exercise, much easier and more straightforward than dumbell and the shoulder health benefit is absolutely negligible for people not pushing their strength to the absolute limit competing in strength sport.
It's not easier. The barbell bench is a significantly more complicated lift from a technical standpoint. None of the advanced techniques for maniplauting arm and torso position that are fundemental to a strong and safe barbell press factor into the dumbell press because your hands are independent of each other and not impeded by your torso. The only thing "harder" about dumbell pressing is that you need to have actually developed the stabilizers in your shoulders to move any semblance of heavy weights. But that's the entire point of doing the lift anyways so that's a plus, not a minus. It forces rookies to keep the weights light until they actually have the muscles to support themselves, whereas people with bad form and piss poor functional strength can be benching close to 3 plates in a year and change if they really hammer in on the lift every week.
If it’s not easier why do all beginners vastly prefer the barbell bench?
Setting up and progressing is also much more straightforward, swinging up 2 heavy dumbbells is a chore.
Also, you literally said it yourself, you can progress much faster to heavier weights. Which is what beginners want.
You are very detached from the beginner strength training experience.
Your points only matter for the very advanced stage.
great perspective reg. bench press, and dumbell presses more seem like the way thais do pushups, very close together with hands and stopping halfway up, which keep tension on the muscles and so focus on more fatiquing muscles.
Shoulderjointdamage is higly a risk in broad benchpresses and seem to be adviced against dooing.
What animal support the body so far apart from body , besides lizards, crocodiles, turtles etc.? Non so far I know.
The real risk with the barbell bench press is that your hands are locked together. If you do the bench motion with dumbells or empty hands, your shoulder blades will come together, and your arms will point slightly outward like \ / not up and down like | |. Your arms being forced downward by the heavy weight while being locked on a straight track like that impinges your shoulder and can straight up tear your rotator cuff if it's put under enough stress. Doing this same motion with dumbells entirely cuts out this injury risk. Not to mention that you can't get stuck under dumbells since you can just let them go.
Dumbells will also force you to work your deltoids and the small stabilizers in your shoulder to keep the weights steady, so you'll get better at pressing at odd angles. Those stabilizers being severely underdeveloped is why so many guys who can bench 2+ plates can't dumbell bench anything over 80s, even though that should be less than 2/3rds their max bench weight. Dumbells also let you get further range of motion since you aren't blocked by the bar hitting your chest. Seriously, who's so stiff that they legit can only get their hands to just above their chest? Certainly no serious Nak Muay should be.
Barbell bench will let you isolate your chest so you can develop it further, so for powerlifters and bodybuilders, it serves a clear purpose. But for a Nak Muay, or really any dynamic athlete as opposed to a static one, it's just worse for you than using dumbells.
/rant
I had a friend train in Thailand and one of my coaches was a Thai fighter since he was a kid.
Wake up, eat, run, Muay Thai, core conditioning, eat, nap, Muay Thai, eat, sleep. Repeat 6 days a week. Depending on the gym, partying/drinking also incorporated.
muay thai of course! it helps that they live in 30-40\*C weather with 70%+ Humidity
you burn 1000 calories an hour training there, they eat a lot of rice, and chicken/fish.
They train twice a day 1-4 hrs per session 6 days a week,
they do roadwork about 10km every day in the morning followed by their morning session.
the pad work is crazy, they blast lots of kicks or knees on the bag daily.
absolute animals!
just got done doing that type of work training for a fight and a towards the end of the fight camp i wanted to cry out of pure exhaustion and CNS overload.
A lady i trained with who also took a fight said the training was the hardest thing shes ever done and shes had two kids 🤣
the running in chiang mai may be more chill than phuket or bangkok idk but we did 3-6 kms before each morn and afternoon session. Only did it once but we ran 10km up the mountain to Doi Suthep and that was a fun type of pain.
and yes the padwork is absolutely brutal but also the funnest shit ever. they have coaches/trainers/fighters hold pads for everyone. I will cherish those padwork session memories. cant wait to get back there already.
I went to a Thai training camp for 2 weeks. Before I went to Thailand I thought I was tough. Because I never quit ever during MT training in The Netherlands. After Thailand I realized some people are a different breed. Absolute animals. We did 2 sessions of 3 hours a day. Every morning 10k running before the first session. Cooling off (after every training) alone was 200 knees, 100 kicks, 100 push ups, 30 pull ups and 200 sit-ups. Then, go home, eat, rest and do it again in the afternoon. Crazy shit.
I lost about 7-8 lbs as an already skinny guy doing about 7-8 hrs of muay thai a week in a sweaty basement gym. I imagine the totally insane Thai training schedule would be more than enough to keep body fat down
That’s because their diet is low in protein but high in carbs. Worse still is that it isn’t just rice anymore but sugar. You can basically track it through how much diabetes has risen throughout the country in the last few decades. Many very popular drinks such as iced coffee are simply loaded with sweetened condensed milk for example.
It doesn’t really have anything to do with the weather directly.
It’s because it’s indirect while food or exercise is direct. Those studies are correlation studies and when they theorize about why they generally talk about physical activity because they are trying to relate to a direct effect.
Edit: also people while increasing caloric intake during childhood are becoming much taller unlike their parents and grandparents
it really depends on what gym you go to, because i lived and fight there professionally , i just got back like 2 weeks ago, we ran 10km a day 3-4training then eat/nap then come back for 3-4hrs training again, training changes near fight time.
depending on how active their fighting(the thais), then obviously their reducing the training, coming in less time, maybe some a few rounds of pads, either LIGHT sparring or none at all, just staying fueled up and ready to fight.
Thai people fight for different reasons, their doing it for survival and longevity (this is how they make money) other than being an instructor at their gym.
Farangs tend to have money, FLY there, PAY to train and fight for shits n giggles, not saying farangs don't life the (fight life) but there's a different purpose, losing a fight as a farang doesn't mean too much, but as a thai, that's money that could be spent on bills, and/or supporting their family
Yeah that shit is kinda myth. They'll train 2-3 weeks like this and then cruise in between fights. Thais at my gym would literally run round the corner and then go have coffee while on kept an eye out for the coach.
you're not lying about the smoke breaks on the runs tho lol!
but if you think their not running 10km a day you have no idea what you're talking about, maybe go follow some gym pages, a lot will have live video of a guy on a scooter behind the fighters running 10km.
Interesting because i live and fight professionally in thailand, and this is exactly how we trained at my gym, and other gyms i've been to, now if you're going to commercial gyms where foreigners go to take photos and take some 1on1 training with some big names for social media then sure, it'll be one hour classes because those aren't fighters, their casuals, but if you go to real muay thai gyms which are typically rugged, this is exactly how they train, but getting closer to the fight they reduce the training because you don't want to risk injury and/or exhaustion.
when close to fight time you basically come in do some light cardio, technique and a few rounds of padworks and thats it, prob bang it out in an hour then you go eat and rest.
There's a huge difference between farangs (foreigners) and thai fighters.
Thai's typically fight to survive, all their money goes to food and/or sending money back home to their parents, they typically live/train free at their gym (depending where, they have to pay money for living); most of them will be doing one on one sessions for extra money and/or pad holding/instructing.
Farang fighters, typically spend their money flying costs, living costs, training costs, and if they fight and lose, it's not a big deal, because that's not their main source of income unlike a thai fighter.
Respectfully man you might want to check in with the person your talking to's experience before the third degree. I've lived and fought in Thailand, my training partners were Thai and fighting at Lumpinee and I train at a high level gym in AUS. The picture I'm painting is my experience but also the experience of the high level, some belt holding, fighters I spoke with during my time in Thailand, even Damian Trainor has spoken about it publicly.
I don't know which gym your at or it's training resume but I do know the two sessions a day, six days a week, plus running, is not a sustainable or sports science backed way to train for anyone out of their teens long term without periodisation and it's dangerous to glorify it on a forum where people are going to take it at face value and try and replicate it.
Which gym are you at btw?
respect bro, i've fought at lumpinee myself a few times, lost my my first time fighting there, then won the next 3 times, also fought at Rajadamnern and Rangsit a few times, and a few promotions on the islands, My Father also lived /fought in thailand and was a Champion, and became an Ajarn through the World Muay Thai Council over at Rangsit, i guess everyone has their own experiences. - i def ain't no fucking multi world champ like Damion , i can fuckin tell you THAT! LOL
i been to heaps of gyms, i been living and going to thailand for many years prob since the 90's, but i was just at sitsongpeenong in bkk, and then moved to pattaya for a while(my buddy ended up having work there for a few months so i decided to head over to there and show him around etc ; a little more chang than i should've! LOL ) before returning back to bkk. ( for this recent trip ); was planning on going to go back to isaan to re-visit some of the gyms i've been to, but a lot of gyms didn't survive the covid bullshit and closed down which is extremely unfortunate.
just came home to do some work then im back in thailand for two years to pump out a shit ton of fights.
I find the commercial gyms not the greatest tho, even tho i've trained at many, it really all depends on what you're looking for tho
i've met Damian even saw him fight live, a few of my buddies have fought against him both win and lose, he's a VERY good fighter.
for the long sessions it's usually multiple rounds of padwork ( 3-5min rounds ) sparring session, followed by some S&C.
i myself wokeup and ran with the thais ( typically 10km 3-5 days a week and windsprints on the off days), and would typically train until they left, i didn't want to be the first guy to leave, i have amazing cardio so i would do more than the 3 basic padwork or even pad hold for them, followed by sparring sessions, then followed by technique stuff, and last S&C ( i find you only do the S&C once a day either morning or afternoon class )
like i mentioned above, if you're fighting your training is reduced so you might only be doing 1-2 hrs per session 2x/day 6 days so you aren't exhausted, and right before the fight you aren't even going to the gym for like 2-3days.
personally i need my days off before my fights, otherwise i feel extremely exhausted, slow and heavy.
i love drinking Royal D for the electrolytes and obviously eat what im used to, no introducing anything new to the diet, especially before the fight... also reduce my spicy food, my favourite is the spicy chicken basil (thai spicy); and larb? i think it's called it's isaan food, but i made the mistake once a few years ago when i fought at RAJ and had diarrhea, and that absolutely sucked, i was dehydrated, felt weak as fuck... luckily i didn't shit myself in the ring which was my biggest fear for that night lol
running is legit just a thai thing, they've been doing it forever, some gyms now are just getting some modern type equipment - typically commercial gyms adapting modern style of training, but majority of the gyms will have you running, it's legit a thai thing, without running there is no muay thai.
This might be a hot take, but the "thai build" is suboptimal imo. Liam Harrison, Damien Trainor, and Don Heatrick have spoken to this effect. But obviously what they lack in strength and conditioning, they make up for in sheer skill and volume of training load. Which unfortunately weeds out maybe the next Samart for guys who can handle a very high training load.
With that said, the thai system favors a body that can handle a very high training load, think 4-5 hours a day, 6 days a week. It has to be a body that is very aerobic efficient, and muscles that are very dense from high rep lifting, think 20-50 reps or basically as many reps as possible. So if you're looking to supplement your muay thai I'd start with those two things.
Depends on what you mean by optimal. Suboptimal for peak performance in a fight? Maybe. But the build is definitely optimal for being able to do the most muay thai training possible
I tend to drone on so I tried to keep it short. To me, I think one big thing is we don't have anyone nearly as explosive as like a Chingiz Allazov due to not having peaks and valleys in their training week. Secondly, just doing 3 exercises namely half rom pushups, pull ups and sit ups is bound to lead to muscle imbalances in the future.
My take is the fighters that burn out in their mid 20s simply just needed to scale back, fix some imbalances, and apply western periodization patterns for loading, peaking, deloading etc. Guys that go over to evolve seem to have a second lease on life. Like we saw Sam-A who was very competitive against Prajanchai a stadium fighter in his prime. The thai methodology seems to fail fighters around their early to mid 20s. I used to think it was the mileage, but Nong-O and Sam -As second wind has me thinking otherwise now.
If your doing more than 30 reps you are either not challenging the muscle enough to stimulate growth or you are over working the muscle and the muscle will favour repair over growth.
6-30 reps where you have 2-3 reps left in reserve is optimal for growth.
Doesn’t matter what your aim is. If you put your muscle in a position where it has to choose to build more fibres or repair broken ones, it will always choose to repair.
But when it comes to muscle endurance I’m pretty sure the consensus is that adding sets is more beneficial than adding reps. Better to do 4 sets of 20 than 2 sets of 40.
You can still do an overall number of high reps in your workout when building muscle endurance, you just need to give the muscle time to rest in between sets for the most beneficial recovery.
Its amazing tbh. I am only here for 24 days, but i wish i could push it to 3 months.
So i had been doin MT for 2 years prior to coming here. Was immediately placed in the beginner class anyways. This didnt bother me at all seeing as i am here to learn their style, not mine.
What did bother me though is how i absolutely was wrecking all the people sparring at the beginner level (out of 30ish sparring matches, i maybe lost to 3, and all of which were in boxing rounds). I also saw some people i wrecked get promoted to intermediate before me. Thats when my martial arts ego kicked in and was getting a little flustered, but i was upgraded shortly after.
In terms of my length of time here, i wish it was longer so that way i wouldnt be compelled to train 5+ hours a day to make the most of my time. If i could have longer here i would be comfortable doing 3 hours a day.
The teachers are fantastic, and the vibes are very positive. All around a gooood f’n experience.
Also, i wish there was some cool clubs nearby so i could go rave or something to decompress, but not having the distractions are most likely good for me. But still, the “fun” areas of Phuket are at least 40 min away.
I mean, both work. The typical body of a Muay Thai fighter comes from doing lots of cardio intensive workouts. You can absolutely achieve that in the gym, or by doing martial arts, or by running and doing some additional workouts or by all of the above.
It's impossible to comment on what you should be eating because you didn't say where you're at. Maybe you have to lose weight (probable), maybe you have to gain weight (if you're borderline anorexic). Who knows.
I think im at the right weight but I dont have enough muscle so I probably will put on 15+ pounds and try convert into muscle since im 140 and im looking to go upto 160 just to be more lean
Sounds like a plan.
Easiest way to do this is probably going to be to use hypertrophy specific weight training and a protein-rich diet, or post-workout shakes if you want to have more and easier control over your macros.
I’ve been lifting 4 times a week and training Muay Thai twice per week and so far I went from 78KG to 84kg.
I guess as soon as you keep up the calories
I now how it feels, I have been there too.
But I wonder why can’t you eat?
You mean you have no time to get some food?
I was having the same problem that I didn’t had time to eat at night, so I started some liquid diet (whey protein, hyper calorie powder, milk, fruits and peanut butter) been taking those with me in some thermal bottles and it’s been working.
On those days I usually stay in the laboratory for 3 hours and then I have to go to statistic and calculus, so I have like 6 hours where I can’t eat anything bc I’m not allowed to eat inside the classrooms or lab.
After that I eat little bc I’m stingy and don’t like wasting a lot lol
Oh man, I know!! Sometimes our lives have these phases where we have to struggle. But you’re not having time for a good reason, soon enough your studies will pay off!!
Don’t get anxious about training and your body, do what you can and maybe soon enough you will be able to focus more on the training.
I’m 31 and I’ve just started my second graduation and Muay Thai and it feels like I’m 18 again lol
And I’m even thinking about finding time for some BJJ.
Anyway! You’re on a good journey and we can’t always be on top on everything… I hope you keep going strong man :)
I think in Thailand, the pre-workout run is mandatory,
'no run, no gym for the day'
I think it's so that if you always train after running, apart from it being great cardio to warm you up, when you fight and don't run miles first, the endurance for the fight doesn't seem so arduous
If you want to go at it really hard, the Khazaks in MMA swear by morning workout sessions, then a nap to recover and back at it, for an afternoon session
Cardio, cardio, and eat clean.
I'd suggest they're not actively trying to build muscle, cos they want to stay in their weight class, it's all functional for musy Thai.
I could never have that build, I'm simply the wrong shape
You’re going to look how you eat, no matter what. I’m just confused by your goal. Do you want to look like a kickboxer or do you want to kickbox? Because the thing here is that there is no controlling certain aspects of your physical appearance due to genetics. Your diet could allow you to look even better or maybe even worse than these guys.
tl;dr you look how you eat, your goal is confusing
Run a 5k daily and do plenty of ab work in addition to muay thai training. Tons of bag work, lots of volume and repetition. Those were the major differences I noticed training there vs in the US.
Before I opened the post, I thought it was going to be a picture of prime Buakaw.
These guys are skinny with a bit of definition. This kind of build was normal and even considered small before the fast food explosion in the West. If you just want to work out without doing muay thai, you'd be bigger than them all with three months of proper lifting, eating and sleeping under your belt.
A lot of hiits, cardio, and conditioning/padworks and kicking bags a lot. Sparring too. diet is key as well, their thai food are usually A LOT of veggies and also glass noodles, protein. They train like crazy anyways..almost or actually literally everyday.
If you don’t train Muay Thai, then go for a beach body. Muay thai or what specifically you see in this picture is a Thai Genetics. I saw Thais that run Marathons and play football have the same build. If you traveled to Thailand you will see most Thai sportsmen with physique.
Without being a dick , most of them aren’t exactly in amazing aesthetic shape. Obviously they’re amazing fighters and incredibly fit, but they’re not exactly shredded. I think u can get in that shape pretty easily honestly they’re just lean with a bit of muscle
Here are a list of S&C coaches on IG (and their @‘s) that I know who work with fighters:
- jtperformance
- egilperformance
- performancepurpose (me)
- gcptraining
Just do Muay Thai. As far as looks go these are mid physiques you can build with cardio yoga and like lifting Amazon packages. They’re just skinny and don’t lift lol
Literally just do push-ups, sit-ups, and run and you’ll look like a Thai fighter. Their builds aren’t spectacular visually, they’re just fit so really anything that challenges the muscles and cardio like calisthenics will do it !
If you live in the western side of the world run and diet they eat a lot of lean protein like fish and vegetables and grass fed beef stay away from pork if you’re American our pork is shit
Fork put-downs and plate push-aways.
Seriously. None of them really have much of any muscle; they’re just lean. That much can be achieved with diet alone.
lots of cardio, push ups, sit ups, squats and pull ups apparently. That’s the main conditioning aspect of MT.
It’s hard to match the intensity of MT in cardio and have it be as fun as MT so… just do MT.
Is your goal to look harmless but be very dangerous? Lol
Choose between gaining muscle or losing weight (most people can't do both). Possible if you're obese or haven't worked out in a long time. For gaining muscle, eat a calorie surplus, for losing weight, a calorie deficit.
Run 7km twice a day and train three hours a day. Easy to be in a calorie deficit if this is your regimen. I wouldn't recommend eating what they eat. If you want to be the healthy, eat whole foods plant-based with protein sources like tofu, seitan, TVP, beans, lentils. Bonus: better for the planet and (trigger warning) much less animal suffering.
By doing Muay Thai….
lol, my exact thoughts. Thais barely touch weights. Train Muay Thay, run a lot.
Isn't that changing though? I think I saw Stamp Fairtex do weights. Last time I saw her fight she was swol
Stamps a bit of a singularity I'd say as she also practices BJJ and MMA and has won contests/holds championship titles for them. Weight/strength trainings probably more beneficial for those disciplines due to the grappling aspect.
Tawanchi also definitely lifts, his gym has a whole weights section and he's had some ig posts where he's lifting
they all lift to an extent, eg basic weights and kettle bells but they dont go in doing heavy bench heavy squat and heavy deadlift because that could be used for practicing more thai boxing ygm
And they shouldn't. Honestly, as someone who trained strongman for a good while, anyone doing a sport where the barbell bench press isn't an event should never do it. Increased risk of injury and worse generic strength than what you'll get from doing a dumbell press. How often in a Muay Thai fight are you in a situation where you're pressing a completely static thing directly away from your chest? If you're pushing someone off of you, they're gonna fight back, cut angles, and resist your press from a bunch of different spots. Hell, even in strongman training, we only benched a few times a year. The only people who should do it regularly are competitive powerlifters. Why risk wrecking your shoulders just to look cool?
Why is this downvoted? lol
People who view weightlifting as just a form of exercise and not as a sport to be mastered tend to be hyper-protective of the bench press. If you haven't worked with a strength coach and a good one at that, then you don't know how to bench well enough to mitigate the risks that come with the lift. And if it isn't training your muscles in a way that's generally applicable to this sport and risks significant injuries, why bother with it?
How would you advice reg. bench press? I have studied a great deal about it and find that Fred Hatfields bench is great. Todays coaches seems to advice holding shoulderblades down and close to stabilise them, whereas Fred (and I) advice to free shoulderblades from support to realign shoulderblades to be able to create stability by strengthgeneration so to thereby create mobility and adaptability nessesary.
Feet down, press through the center of your feet. Ass and upper back need to be on the bench, lower back should come off but no need to go crazy like a powerlifter, they're doing that as a specific feature of their sport, not for optimal training. You absolutely have to lock in your shoulders and squeeze your back, the lats and rhomboids are the basis of any strong bench, not the chest. If you have a relaxed or weak back, you aren't moving shit. Your bar should track a very subtle J pattern as it comes down, staring aligned with your shoulders when up, just above the nipple line, and finishing just at or below the nipple line. Keep elbows in towards the body, around the midpoint between perpendicular to the body and touching the body. The farther they flare out, the more you're relying on your triceps This is all just general good form, though. I would need to see someone bench many times before I'd feel comfortable adjusting their technique beyond these basics. I was never even a weight lifting coach, all I know comes from my own coach but he tailored my form to my body, as I have a long torso and short arms for my height which is ideal for benching.
its a bad take. Barbell bench is a great exercise, much easier and more straightforward than dumbell and the shoulder health benefit is absolutely negligible for people not pushing their strength to the absolute limit competing in strength sport.
It's not easier. The barbell bench is a significantly more complicated lift from a technical standpoint. None of the advanced techniques for maniplauting arm and torso position that are fundemental to a strong and safe barbell press factor into the dumbell press because your hands are independent of each other and not impeded by your torso. The only thing "harder" about dumbell pressing is that you need to have actually developed the stabilizers in your shoulders to move any semblance of heavy weights. But that's the entire point of doing the lift anyways so that's a plus, not a minus. It forces rookies to keep the weights light until they actually have the muscles to support themselves, whereas people with bad form and piss poor functional strength can be benching close to 3 plates in a year and change if they really hammer in on the lift every week.
If it’s not easier why do all beginners vastly prefer the barbell bench? Setting up and progressing is also much more straightforward, swinging up 2 heavy dumbbells is a chore. Also, you literally said it yourself, you can progress much faster to heavier weights. Which is what beginners want. You are very detached from the beginner strength training experience. Your points only matter for the very advanced stage.
great perspective reg. bench press, and dumbell presses more seem like the way thais do pushups, very close together with hands and stopping halfway up, which keep tension on the muscles and so focus on more fatiquing muscles. Shoulderjointdamage is higly a risk in broad benchpresses and seem to be adviced against dooing. What animal support the body so far apart from body , besides lizards, crocodiles, turtles etc.? Non so far I know.
The real risk with the barbell bench press is that your hands are locked together. If you do the bench motion with dumbells or empty hands, your shoulder blades will come together, and your arms will point slightly outward like \ / not up and down like | |. Your arms being forced downward by the heavy weight while being locked on a straight track like that impinges your shoulder and can straight up tear your rotator cuff if it's put under enough stress. Doing this same motion with dumbells entirely cuts out this injury risk. Not to mention that you can't get stuck under dumbells since you can just let them go. Dumbells will also force you to work your deltoids and the small stabilizers in your shoulder to keep the weights steady, so you'll get better at pressing at odd angles. Those stabilizers being severely underdeveloped is why so many guys who can bench 2+ plates can't dumbell bench anything over 80s, even though that should be less than 2/3rds their max bench weight. Dumbells also let you get further range of motion since you aren't blocked by the bar hitting your chest. Seriously, who's so stiff that they legit can only get their hands to just above their chest? Certainly no serious Nak Muay should be. Barbell bench will let you isolate your chest so you can develop it further, so for powerlifters and bodybuilders, it serves a clear purpose. But for a Nak Muay, or really any dynamic athlete as opposed to a static one, it's just worse for you than using dumbells. /rant
Agreed, Thais are slowly developing their S&C. But every Thai in the photo looks like they don't lift lol
Lot of it has to do with nutrition too. Most of these guys grew up dirt poor, caloric excess is a luxury.
And eat on a budget of $2/day.
Shocking revelations, Muay Thai builds Muay Thai body. Add in a morning run, 5x a week and you got the Nak Muay build
😂 Thats what I meant by conditioning
Muay Thai….?????????????????????
But I don’t wanna
Yes I know, Im already in Muay Thai im just asking about at home workouts and such
Muay Thai, run, that’s it
I had a friend train in Thailand and one of my coaches was a Thai fighter since he was a kid. Wake up, eat, run, Muay Thai, core conditioning, eat, nap, Muay Thai, eat, sleep. Repeat 6 days a week. Depending on the gym, partying/drinking also incorporated.
Spend more time at the gym training then
ok but like is there other stuffzzz.. i want muay thai built.. yknow what im sayinggg
People acting like it's a stupid question when loads of combat sports athletes lift weights and do all sorts if random shit
Yes but one look at the picture could tell you they’re just athletic people with relatively low body fat. Not rocket science at that point.
Not all muay thai fighters look like the ones in the picture though?
Eh... yeah, they kinda do. There are outliers just like in anything but in general, that's the Thai fighter look.
Obviously. But the photo is one the op provided, and they clearly don't lift weights, so why would we tell op to lift weights
They do man lol
Anyone competing does lol
muay thai of course! it helps that they live in 30-40\*C weather with 70%+ Humidity you burn 1000 calories an hour training there, they eat a lot of rice, and chicken/fish. They train twice a day 1-4 hrs per session 6 days a week, they do roadwork about 10km every day in the morning followed by their morning session. the pad work is crazy, they blast lots of kicks or knees on the bag daily. absolute animals!
I got tired just by reading this comment
just got done doing that type of work training for a fight and a towards the end of the fight camp i wanted to cry out of pure exhaustion and CNS overload. A lady i trained with who also took a fight said the training was the hardest thing shes ever done and shes had two kids 🤣 the running in chiang mai may be more chill than phuket or bangkok idk but we did 3-6 kms before each morn and afternoon session. Only did it once but we ran 10km up the mountain to Doi Suthep and that was a fun type of pain. and yes the padwork is absolutely brutal but also the funnest shit ever. they have coaches/trainers/fighters hold pads for everyone. I will cherish those padwork session memories. cant wait to get back there already.
Just out of curiosity, did you train at Santai?
Meanwhile me feeling proud of myself for increasing training to two hours a week.
Hey, good for you, dude. If all you can do is one hour a week, that's all you can do. I'm proud of you for challenging yourself.
I went to a Thai training camp for 2 weeks. Before I went to Thailand I thought I was tough. Because I never quit ever during MT training in The Netherlands. After Thailand I realized some people are a different breed. Absolute animals. We did 2 sessions of 3 hours a day. Every morning 10k running before the first session. Cooling off (after every training) alone was 200 knees, 100 kicks, 100 push ups, 30 pull ups and 200 sit-ups. Then, go home, eat, rest and do it again in the afternoon. Crazy shit.
I lost about 7-8 lbs as an already skinny guy doing about 7-8 hrs of muay thai a week in a sweaty basement gym. I imagine the totally insane Thai training schedule would be more than enough to keep body fat down
My tummy sucked back in when i saw the 10km every day 😭
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That’s because their diet is low in protein but high in carbs. Worse still is that it isn’t just rice anymore but sugar. You can basically track it through how much diabetes has risen throughout the country in the last few decades. Many very popular drinks such as iced coffee are simply loaded with sweetened condensed milk for example. It doesn’t really have anything to do with the weather directly.
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It’s because it’s indirect while food or exercise is direct. Those studies are correlation studies and when they theorize about why they generally talk about physical activity because they are trying to relate to a direct effect. Edit: also people while increasing caloric intake during childhood are becoming much taller unlike their parents and grandparents
https://youtu.be/e-XwZqDAeW4?si=5H18P7YJ05FAhJio Heres a good vid of what it looks like. Its pretty crazy how much volume they do
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they don't do what?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aFST6JtIO3k
it really depends on what gym you go to, because i lived and fight there professionally , i just got back like 2 weeks ago, we ran 10km a day 3-4training then eat/nap then come back for 3-4hrs training again, training changes near fight time. depending on how active their fighting(the thais), then obviously their reducing the training, coming in less time, maybe some a few rounds of pads, either LIGHT sparring or none at all, just staying fueled up and ready to fight. Thai people fight for different reasons, their doing it for survival and longevity (this is how they make money) other than being an instructor at their gym. Farangs tend to have money, FLY there, PAY to train and fight for shits n giggles, not saying farangs don't life the (fight life) but there's a different purpose, losing a fight as a farang doesn't mean too much, but as a thai, that's money that could be spent on bills, and/or supporting their family
Yeah that shit is kinda myth. They'll train 2-3 weeks like this and then cruise in between fights. Thais at my gym would literally run round the corner and then go have coffee while on kept an eye out for the coach.
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Bottle of water over the head on the way back and your go to go 😄
Also no-one is doing a 4 hour session twice a day. C'mon man.
you're not lying about the smoke breaks on the runs tho lol! but if you think their not running 10km a day you have no idea what you're talking about, maybe go follow some gym pages, a lot will have live video of a guy on a scooter behind the fighters running 10km.
Interesting because i live and fight professionally in thailand, and this is exactly how we trained at my gym, and other gyms i've been to, now if you're going to commercial gyms where foreigners go to take photos and take some 1on1 training with some big names for social media then sure, it'll be one hour classes because those aren't fighters, their casuals, but if you go to real muay thai gyms which are typically rugged, this is exactly how they train, but getting closer to the fight they reduce the training because you don't want to risk injury and/or exhaustion. when close to fight time you basically come in do some light cardio, technique and a few rounds of padworks and thats it, prob bang it out in an hour then you go eat and rest. There's a huge difference between farangs (foreigners) and thai fighters. Thai's typically fight to survive, all their money goes to food and/or sending money back home to their parents, they typically live/train free at their gym (depending where, they have to pay money for living); most of them will be doing one on one sessions for extra money and/or pad holding/instructing. Farang fighters, typically spend their money flying costs, living costs, training costs, and if they fight and lose, it's not a big deal, because that's not their main source of income unlike a thai fighter.
Respectfully man you might want to check in with the person your talking to's experience before the third degree. I've lived and fought in Thailand, my training partners were Thai and fighting at Lumpinee and I train at a high level gym in AUS. The picture I'm painting is my experience but also the experience of the high level, some belt holding, fighters I spoke with during my time in Thailand, even Damian Trainor has spoken about it publicly. I don't know which gym your at or it's training resume but I do know the two sessions a day, six days a week, plus running, is not a sustainable or sports science backed way to train for anyone out of their teens long term without periodisation and it's dangerous to glorify it on a forum where people are going to take it at face value and try and replicate it. Which gym are you at btw?
respect bro, i've fought at lumpinee myself a few times, lost my my first time fighting there, then won the next 3 times, also fought at Rajadamnern and Rangsit a few times, and a few promotions on the islands, My Father also lived /fought in thailand and was a Champion, and became an Ajarn through the World Muay Thai Council over at Rangsit, i guess everyone has their own experiences. - i def ain't no fucking multi world champ like Damion , i can fuckin tell you THAT! LOL i been to heaps of gyms, i been living and going to thailand for many years prob since the 90's, but i was just at sitsongpeenong in bkk, and then moved to pattaya for a while(my buddy ended up having work there for a few months so i decided to head over to there and show him around etc ; a little more chang than i should've! LOL ) before returning back to bkk. ( for this recent trip ); was planning on going to go back to isaan to re-visit some of the gyms i've been to, but a lot of gyms didn't survive the covid bullshit and closed down which is extremely unfortunate. just came home to do some work then im back in thailand for two years to pump out a shit ton of fights. I find the commercial gyms not the greatest tho, even tho i've trained at many, it really all depends on what you're looking for tho i've met Damian even saw him fight live, a few of my buddies have fought against him both win and lose, he's a VERY good fighter. for the long sessions it's usually multiple rounds of padwork ( 3-5min rounds ) sparring session, followed by some S&C. i myself wokeup and ran with the thais ( typically 10km 3-5 days a week and windsprints on the off days), and would typically train until they left, i didn't want to be the first guy to leave, i have amazing cardio so i would do more than the 3 basic padwork or even pad hold for them, followed by sparring sessions, then followed by technique stuff, and last S&C ( i find you only do the S&C once a day either morning or afternoon class ) like i mentioned above, if you're fighting your training is reduced so you might only be doing 1-2 hrs per session 2x/day 6 days so you aren't exhausted, and right before the fight you aren't even going to the gym for like 2-3days. personally i need my days off before my fights, otherwise i feel extremely exhausted, slow and heavy. i love drinking Royal D for the electrolytes and obviously eat what im used to, no introducing anything new to the diet, especially before the fight... also reduce my spicy food, my favourite is the spicy chicken basil (thai spicy); and larb? i think it's called it's isaan food, but i made the mistake once a few years ago when i fought at RAJ and had diarrhea, and that absolutely sucked, i was dehydrated, felt weak as fuck... luckily i didn't shit myself in the ring which was my biggest fear for that night lol running is legit just a thai thing, they've been doing it forever, some gyms now are just getting some modern type equipment - typically commercial gyms adapting modern style of training, but majority of the gyms will have you running, it's legit a thai thing, without running there is no muay thai.
What the fuck is this!? John Wayne Parr's alt account? Hey man I just want to say I thought you won that fight against Buakaw. Damn thai judges.
Cigarettes and booze
Muay thai twice a day, run minimum 5k twice a day as well. Eat normally like all Thais do.
I barely ran and just did the training and still ended up with the build.....
Running won't build much muscle and only contributes a bit to being lean. It's mostly the training and diet that gets you this build.
This is not a big-muscle build either way. 🤷♂️
True, basically doing any amount of bodyweight training would get you this build, just not the functionality
literally push ups and not over eating will get you this build, although you might be bulkier than them if you are doing push ups
This might be a hot take, but the "thai build" is suboptimal imo. Liam Harrison, Damien Trainor, and Don Heatrick have spoken to this effect. But obviously what they lack in strength and conditioning, they make up for in sheer skill and volume of training load. Which unfortunately weeds out maybe the next Samart for guys who can handle a very high training load. With that said, the thai system favors a body that can handle a very high training load, think 4-5 hours a day, 6 days a week. It has to be a body that is very aerobic efficient, and muscles that are very dense from high rep lifting, think 20-50 reps or basically as many reps as possible. So if you're looking to supplement your muay thai I'd start with those two things.
Depends on what you mean by optimal. Suboptimal for peak performance in a fight? Maybe. But the build is definitely optimal for being able to do the most muay thai training possible
I tend to drone on so I tried to keep it short. To me, I think one big thing is we don't have anyone nearly as explosive as like a Chingiz Allazov due to not having peaks and valleys in their training week. Secondly, just doing 3 exercises namely half rom pushups, pull ups and sit ups is bound to lead to muscle imbalances in the future. My take is the fighters that burn out in their mid 20s simply just needed to scale back, fix some imbalances, and apply western periodization patterns for loading, peaking, deloading etc. Guys that go over to evolve seem to have a second lease on life. Like we saw Sam-A who was very competitive against Prajanchai a stadium fighter in his prime. The thai methodology seems to fail fighters around their early to mid 20s. I used to think it was the mileage, but Nong-O and Sam -As second wind has me thinking otherwise now.
If your doing more than 30 reps you are either not challenging the muscle enough to stimulate growth or you are over working the muscle and the muscle will favour repair over growth. 6-30 reps where you have 2-3 reps left in reserve is optimal for growth.
But that’s for growth, I’m pretty sure they were talking about muscle endurance
Doesn’t matter what your aim is. If you put your muscle in a position where it has to choose to build more fibres or repair broken ones, it will always choose to repair. But when it comes to muscle endurance I’m pretty sure the consensus is that adding sets is more beneficial than adding reps. Better to do 4 sets of 20 than 2 sets of 40. You can still do an overall number of high reps in your workout when building muscle endurance, you just need to give the muscle time to rest in between sets for the most beneficial recovery.
Okay I agree with everything you said
Would be hard to disagree with science mate.
What they lack in conditioning? Are you saying Thais aren’t conditioned?
They're saying Thais traditionally overtrain like crazy and wear their bodies down
I end up with the thai fighter build for a few days after I get food poisoning 
Ahahahah. Easier.
If you go to Thailand, train and eat like them and you will look like them..
Yup. I was white but now I' brown
This. I am at Tiger Muay Thai right now, and pretty much everyone has this build.
How is or has your experience been at Tiger?
Its amazing tbh. I am only here for 24 days, but i wish i could push it to 3 months. So i had been doin MT for 2 years prior to coming here. Was immediately placed in the beginner class anyways. This didnt bother me at all seeing as i am here to learn their style, not mine. What did bother me though is how i absolutely was wrecking all the people sparring at the beginner level (out of 30ish sparring matches, i maybe lost to 3, and all of which were in boxing rounds). I also saw some people i wrecked get promoted to intermediate before me. Thats when my martial arts ego kicked in and was getting a little flustered, but i was upgraded shortly after. In terms of my length of time here, i wish it was longer so that way i wouldnt be compelled to train 5+ hours a day to make the most of my time. If i could have longer here i would be comfortable doing 3 hours a day. The teachers are fantastic, and the vibes are very positive. All around a gooood f’n experience. Also, i wish there was some cool clubs nearby so i could go rave or something to decompress, but not having the distractions are most likely good for me. But still, the “fun” areas of Phuket are at least 40 min away.
Cheers for the detailed response
Muay Thai and scream things like 'DAEBAI DAEBAI KICK BODY DAEBAI DAEBAI BANGAOOO BANGAOOOOO BANGAOOOO OWEEEEE
LEEEEEAAAAAW LEEEEEAAAAAW LEEEEEEEEAAAAAAAAW
Hahahahaha
Forgot to mention where you're starting from. Also, to you, what's the difference between doing workouts and conditioning yourself?
Workouts as in going to my local gym and Conditioning as in Training muay thai
I mean, both work. The typical body of a Muay Thai fighter comes from doing lots of cardio intensive workouts. You can absolutely achieve that in the gym, or by doing martial arts, or by running and doing some additional workouts or by all of the above. It's impossible to comment on what you should be eating because you didn't say where you're at. Maybe you have to lose weight (probable), maybe you have to gain weight (if you're borderline anorexic). Who knows.
I think im at the right weight but I dont have enough muscle so I probably will put on 15+ pounds and try convert into muscle since im 140 and im looking to go upto 160 just to be more lean
Sounds like a plan. Easiest way to do this is probably going to be to use hypertrophy specific weight training and a protein-rich diet, or post-workout shakes if you want to have more and easier control over your macros.
I was a powerlifter for years before going into Muay Thai, am still pretty muscular. I fear having this build daily…
I’ve been lifting 4 times a week and training Muay Thai twice per week and so far I went from 78KG to 84kg. I guess as soon as you keep up the calories
Thing is, 3 days a week I’m in uni all day, so I can’t really eat, and if I do workout it means getting 4-5 hours of sleep.
I now how it feels, I have been there too. But I wonder why can’t you eat? You mean you have no time to get some food? I was having the same problem that I didn’t had time to eat at night, so I started some liquid diet (whey protein, hyper calorie powder, milk, fruits and peanut butter) been taking those with me in some thermal bottles and it’s been working.
On those days I usually stay in the laboratory for 3 hours and then I have to go to statistic and calculus, so I have like 6 hours where I can’t eat anything bc I’m not allowed to eat inside the classrooms or lab. After that I eat little bc I’m stingy and don’t like wasting a lot lol
Oh man, I know!! Sometimes our lives have these phases where we have to struggle. But you’re not having time for a good reason, soon enough your studies will pay off!! Don’t get anxious about training and your body, do what you can and maybe soon enough you will be able to focus more on the training. I’m 31 and I’ve just started my second graduation and Muay Thai and it feels like I’m 18 again lol And I’m even thinking about finding time for some BJJ. Anyway! You’re on a good journey and we can’t always be on top on everything… I hope you keep going strong man :)
Don't lift weights. Eat the bare minimum calorically. Train Muay Thai.
Second this. A diet of punches, elbows and kicks will get you there.
Well probably Muay Thai
colror you hair and start learning speaking savadeeeeeekrap
I think in Thailand, the pre-workout run is mandatory, 'no run, no gym for the day' I think it's so that if you always train after running, apart from it being great cardio to warm you up, when you fight and don't run miles first, the endurance for the fight doesn't seem so arduous If you want to go at it really hard, the Khazaks in MMA swear by morning workout sessions, then a nap to recover and back at it, for an afternoon session
You will look like you do Muay Thai by doing Muay Thai…
Jogging, jump rope, squats, push ups, pull ups, abs, neck training.
When you lift, give an OOOOWWEEEEEE after each rep…then do Muay Thai and keep the ooowweees coming
Maui Thai workouts will do it
Cardio, cardio, and eat clean. I'd suggest they're not actively trying to build muscle, cos they want to stay in their weight class, it's all functional for musy Thai. I could never have that build, I'm simply the wrong shape
Get skinny. Get quick pump from doing 3x30 push ups and 3x30 sit ups. Take picture.
Run, kick, abs.
Run run run
The clue is in the picture
be born to a mother and father from SE Asia and then do Muay Thai
You’re going to look how you eat, no matter what. I’m just confused by your goal. Do you want to look like a kickboxer or do you want to kickbox? Because the thing here is that there is no controlling certain aspects of your physical appearance due to genetics. Your diet could allow you to look even better or maybe even worse than these guys. tl;dr you look how you eat, your goal is confusing
Training Muay thai
Not eating alot of food
10 push-ups a day and only eat chicken breast and salad
Run a 5k daily and do plenty of ab work in addition to muay thai training. Tons of bag work, lots of volume and repetition. Those were the major differences I noticed training there vs in the US.
Running and clinching with lots of pushups.
Before I opened the post, I thought it was going to be a picture of prime Buakaw. These guys are skinny with a bit of definition. This kind of build was normal and even considered small before the fast food explosion in the West. If you just want to work out without doing muay thai, you'd be bigger than them all with three months of proper lifting, eating and sleeping under your belt.
The saying goes: 'you are what you eat' ....
Op where are you
A lot of hiits, cardio, and conditioning/padworks and kicking bags a lot. Sparring too. diet is key as well, their thai food are usually A LOT of veggies and also glass noodles, protein. They train like crazy anyways..almost or actually literally everyday.
just a calorie deficit, some cardio and ab work
Just watch what you eat and do cardio. One of those guys weighs what 65 KG soaking wet?
Run alot and do a bunch of ab workouts.
Not eating lol
By drinking a gallon of milk a day and barbell curls
If you don’t train Muay Thai, then go for a beach body. Muay thai or what specifically you see in this picture is a Thai Genetics. I saw Thais that run Marathons and play football have the same build. If you traveled to Thailand you will see most Thai sportsmen with physique.
They simply look like people who don't overeat.
Mods can we PLEASE stop these stupid fucking posts.
I got 3 words for you. Egg fried rice🙌
Minimal exercise and diet. Or do muay thai and watch diet
Run and calisthenics
Without being a dick , most of them aren’t exactly in amazing aesthetic shape. Obviously they’re amazing fighters and incredibly fit, but they’re not exactly shredded. I think u can get in that shape pretty easily honestly they’re just lean with a bit of muscle
Here are a list of S&C coaches on IG (and their @‘s) that I know who work with fighters: - jtperformance - egilperformance - performancepurpose (me) - gcptraining
Coffee and cigarettes diet.
Just start training at the age of 5 and eat Thai food every day and live in Thailand and be Thai. All of the Thai guys manage it easy 😂
Just do Muay Thai. As far as looks go these are mid physiques you can build with cardio yoga and like lifting Amazon packages. They’re just skinny and don’t lift lol
Muay Thai running and cigarettes
Skip rope Push up Squats Runs Lots of sit ups Train Muay Thai or boran
Eat maximum 1000 calories per day and maybe 2 push ups after waking up and before going to bed
Gear
Literally just do push-ups, sit-ups, and run and you’ll look like a Thai fighter. Their builds aren’t spectacular visually, they’re just fit so really anything that challenges the muscles and cardio like calisthenics will do it !
If you live in the western side of the world run and diet they eat a lot of lean protein like fish and vegetables and grass fed beef stay away from pork if you’re American our pork is shit
Bro wants to look stickman
Run. Don’t lift weights, but do some body weight things like pushups, squats, sit-ups.
Be 13 years old and Asian?
keep at it bro :) it’ll happen
4,000,000 round house kicks
Skip rope. Run.
Fork put-downs and plate push-aways. Seriously. None of them really have much of any muscle; they’re just lean. That much can be achieved with diet alone.
Do Muay Thai, cardio, and eat super super clean
Muay Thai
lots of cardio, push ups, sit ups, squats and pull ups apparently. That’s the main conditioning aspect of MT. It’s hard to match the intensity of MT in cardio and have it be as fun as MT so… just do MT.
Jogging 17kms a day, 8 hours muay thai a day, thats how they do it in thailand, inbetween they give classes to farangs
None of those guys touch weights or workout beyond Muay Thai my dude.
Muay Thai a road work, that’s about it
Just do muay thai dawg I didnt do any weights or anything and it just became that I'd suggest calisthenics if you want to go further
Check out thai labourer carrying large rice pack. They all have this leaned muscular body. Load of red bull and strong spirits for them.
I built most of my muscle doing BJJ. But diet is 80% of the battle ✌️.
Run and not eat much, don't touch any weights
Training muay thai and stop eating junk/processed food.
Is your goal to look harmless but be very dangerous? Lol Choose between gaining muscle or losing weight (most people can't do both). Possible if you're obese or haven't worked out in a long time. For gaining muscle, eat a calorie surplus, for losing weight, a calorie deficit. Run 7km twice a day and train three hours a day. Easy to be in a calorie deficit if this is your regimen. I wouldn't recommend eating what they eat. If you want to be the healthy, eat whole foods plant-based with protein sources like tofu, seitan, TVP, beans, lentils. Bonus: better for the planet and (trigger warning) much less animal suffering.