Basic of Muaythai

Basic Muay Thai Techniques

Muay Thai Stance
The word Jod Muay refer to the action that boxer perform stance to be ready to fight/defend. Muay Thai stance posture is generally a bit different from western boxing. As Muay Thai has more weapons than western boxing, which generally use only fists. Due to this reason Muay Thai stance requires all of weapons, including fists, elbows, knees, shins, to be ready for action. There are some correct forms of Muay Thai stance and you have to practice and follow those correct form. However, even though there are correct forms of Muay Thai stance, boxer may adjust and adopting their own style based on the formal practice to make themselves most comfortable.
Generally, correct form of Muay Thai stance is all about positioning hands, arms, chin and feet.

These fundamental approaches should be positioned in correct way, but have to be sure in relaxed and prompt in the same time.
The basic form of Muay Thai stance
Head: Bend down your head a bit to protect your chin

Eyes: Always looking at you opponent and focus on which point you are going to attach as well as assess the opponent’s movements.

Arms: Both lead arms and rear arms shift to protect upper part of your trunk
Do not keep your arms too close to the face. I have personal experience that my Kru punch me straight to the arm guard then my arms bump to hit my face instead.

Body: Do not bend down too much, keep body straight a bit to keep eyes focus to the opponent.

Hand/Fists: Raised to the eyebrow level to protect your face. Extend lead fist to the front. Normally, lead arm will more extend than rear arm depends on whether you are right-handed boxer or left-handed boxer, and some boxers may extend his arm equally.

Feet: Same as positioning your fists, if you are right-handed boxer use left foot as a lead foot pointing towards opponent, if you are left-handed boxer use right foot as a lead foot pointing towards opponent.

The most important posture that make Muay Thai stance unique and different from any other kind of boxing is the position of leg and feet. Lead foot and rare foot should be positioned carefully to make sure that lead foot ready to attack. Generally we use rare foot to attack (kick) and lead foot to support when kicking.
More importantly, do not rest your feet flat on the ground. Shift your heel a bit above the ground to make sure you are ready.

Muay Thai Footwork

As same as other element of Muay Thai martial arts the foot work of Muay Thai may a bit different from footwork of western boxing. As Muay Thai footwork has to apply all of Muay Thai stance in order to prepare for effectively attack and defence. The essential to employ Muay Thai footwork is in order to 1) To be in the position that you will be ready for attack by using multiple Muay Thai weapons (for example, punch, then kick) 2) To be ready to defence opponent’s attack. Apart form that the effective Muay Thai footwork will benefit boxer in terms of give you advantage of your opponent and some time correct form of Muay Thai footwork makes it very difficult for opponent to attack you.

Practicing Muay Thai footwork requires repeatedly training with those various form until boxer can find the footwork style that he feel most comfortable to do. Because Muay Thai footwork is very important basic element and it is a fundamental technique in order to perform effective attack and defence.

Boxer should be aware that he must apply Muay basic Muay thai stance all the time when performing footwork, regardless to which form of footwork they are using. During the fight, boxer may use many of footwork method that they think will be suitable for particular situation and they may use it as many times as they want.

There are many form of traditional Muay Thai footwork, and footwork generally consists of these basic elements.

1. Yang Sam Khum (shuffle)
2. Sueb Tao (to step forward or slide shuffle)
3. Kao Chak (Slide Footwork)
4. Yok Khao Bang (Leg-block)
5. Then ( Skipping )
6. Kra Dode (Jumping)

During the fight, boxer may combine all elements of footwork in order to make effective attack or defence, but importantly to remember that always apply Muay thai stance all the time with the footwork.

Muay Thai Weapons

Muay Thai weapons consist of head, fists, elbow, knee and feet. Even though using head to attack is not allowed in professional and amateur competitions these days, but you can still learn how to attack by using head for self-defense.

Muay Thai is very unique in terms of having many of weapons and variety of method to attack. Muay Thai is very effective of using all parts of the body equally to attack as well as defend. Especially using elbows and knees, which have incredible destructive power when they are used correctly

The comprehensive detail of Muay Thai attacks will be provided in training section. If you are a Muay Thai beginner, it is very essential to get to know these basic terminology of Muay Thai weapons as listed below;

Attacking methods–terms and vocabularies
There are basic key terms that we use calling part of the body and technique usage related to them as Muay Thai weapons.

Mud = Fists
Sork = Elbow
Khao = Knee
Tao = Foot

Technique
Punch = Chok
Elbow Strike = Tee Sork / Fun Sork
Knee Kick = Tee Khao
Kick = Tae
Foot-Thrust = Theeb