Techniques of Thai Boxing

The basic offensive techniques in Muay Thai use fists, elbows, shins, feet, and knees to strike the opponent. To bind the opponent for both offensive and defensive purposes, small amounts of stand-up grappling are used: the clinch. Muay Thai is often a fighting art of attrition, where opponents exchange blows with one another. This is certainly the case with traditional stylists in Thailand, but is a less popular form of fighting in the contemporary world fighting circuit. With the success of Muay Thai in mixed martial arts fighting, it has become the de facto martial art of choice for competitive stand-up fighters. As a result, it has evolved and incorporated much more powerful hand striking techniques used in western style boxing and the Thai style of exchanging blow for blow is no longer favorable. Note: when Muay Thai fighters compete against fighters of other styles (and if the rules permit it), they almost invariably emphasize elbow (sok) and knee (kao) techniques to gain a distinct advantage in fighting. Almost all techniques in Muay Thai use the entire body movement, rotating the hip with each kick, punch, and block. The rotation of the hips in Muay Thai techniques, and intensive focus on "core muscles" (such as abdominal muscles and surrounding muscles) is very distinctive and is what sets Muay Thai apart from other styles of martial arts.

The Clinch

In Western Boxing, the two fighters are separated when they clinch, in Muay Thai however, they are not. It is often in the clinch where knee techniques are used. The clinch should be performed with the palm of one hand on the back of the other and not as shown in the picture.There are three reasons why the fingers must not be intertwined.

1) In the ring fighters are wearing boxing gloves and cannot intertwine their fingers.

2) The Thai clinch involves pressing the head of the opponent downwards, which is easier if the hands are locked behind the back of the head instead of behind the neck. Furthermore the arms should be putting as much pressure on the neck as possible.

3) You can injure your fingers if they are intertwined, and it is harder to release the grip if you want to elbow your opponent's head quickly

A correct clinch also involves your forearms pressing against the other fighter's collar bone while your hands are around the opponent's head rather than his neck. The general way to get out of a clinch (not the one pictured) is to push the opponents head backwards, as the clinch requires both participants to be very close to one another.

Defense against punches and kicks

Defensively, the concept of "wall of defense" is used, in which shoulders, arms and legs are used to hinder the attacker from successfully executing his techniques. Blocking is a critical element in Muay Thai and compounds the level of conditioning a successful practitioner must possess. Low and mid body roundhouse kicks are normally blocked with the upper portion of a raised shin. High body strikes are blocked with the forearm/glove, elbow/shin. Mid section roundhouse kicks can also be caught/trapped, allowing for a sweep or counter attack to the remaining leg of the opponent. Punches are blocked with an ordinary boxing guard and techniques similar if not idenitical to basic boxing technique. A common means of blocking a punch is using the hand on the same side as the oncoming punch. For example, if an orthodox fighter throws a jab (being his left hand), the defender will make a slight tap to redirect the punches angle with his right hand. The deflection is always as small and precise as possible to avoid unnecessary energy expendature and return the hand to the guard as quickly as possible. Hooks are most often blocked with a motion most often described as "combing your hair," raising the elbow forward and effectively shielding the head with the forearm, flexed bicep, and shoulder. More advanced Muay Thai blocks are usually counters, used to damage your opponent before he can attack again.

Elbow techniques



The elbow can be used in seven ways: horizontal, diagonal-upwards, diagonal-downwards, uppercut, downward, backward-spinning and flying. From the side it can be used as either a finishing move or as a way to cut the opponent's eyebrow so that blood might block his vision. The blood also raises the opponent's awareness of being hurt which could affect his performance. This is the most common way of using the elbow. The diagonal elbows are faster than the other forms, but are less powerful. The uppercut and flying elbows are the most powerful, but are slower and easier to avoid or block. The downward elbow is usually used as a finishing move.
There is also a distinct difference between a single elbow and a follow-up elbow. The single elbow is an elbow move independent from any other move, whereas a follow-up elbow is the second strike from the same arm, being a hook first with an elbow follow-up. Such elbows, and most other elbows, are used when the distance between fighters becomes too small and there is too little space to throw a hook at the opponent's head.

Kicking techniques

The teep (literally "foot jab," similar to a front kick) and Cutting the tree (kicking upwards in the shape of a triangle cutting under the arm and ribs) are the two most common kicks in Muay Thai. The Muay Thai roundhouse kick has been widely adopted by fighters from other martial arts. The roundhouse kick uses a rotational movement of the entire body. A Thai fighter uses this to his advantage, and if a round house kick is attempted by the opponent the fighter will block with his shin. Thai boxers are trained to always connect with the shin. While sensitive in an unconditioned practitioner, the shin is the strongest part of the leg for experienced Muay Thai fighters. The foot contains many fine bones and is much weaker. A fighter may end up hurting himself if he tries to attack with his foot.
Muay Thai also includes other varieties of kicking, such as the axe kick, side kick or spinning back kick etc. These kicks, depending on the fighter are utilized as to the preference of the fighter. It is worth noting that a side kick is performed differently in Muay Thai than the traditional side kick of other martial arts. In Muay Thai, a side kick is executed by first raising the knee of the leg that is going to kick in order to convince the opponent that the executor is going to perform a teep or front kick. The hips are then shifted to the side to the more traditional side kick position for the kick itself. The "fake-out" always precedes the kick in Muay Thai technique.

Knee techniques


Some knee techniques ("kao")
- Kao Dode (Jumping knee strike) - the Thai boxer jumps up on one leg and strikes with that leg's knee.

- Kao Loi (Flying knee strike) - the Thai boxer takes step(s), jumps forward and off one leg and strikes with that leg's knee. A quite spectacular sight when it connects.

- Kao Tone (Straight knee strike) - the Thai boxer simply thrusts it forward (not upwards, unless he is holding an oppenents head down in a clinch and intend to knee upwards into the face). According to one written source, this technique is somewhat more recent than Kao Dode or Kao Loi. Supposedly, when the Thai boxers fought with rope-bound hands rather than the modern boxing gloves, this particular technique was subject to potentially vicious cutting, slicing and sawing by an alert opponent who would block it or deflect it with the sharp "rope-glove" edges or sometimes by the glass glued onto the "rope-gloves". This explanation also holds true for some of the following knee strikes below as well.

- Kao Noi (Small knee strike) - the Thai boxer hits the inside upper thigh (above the knee) of the opponent when clinching. This technique is used to wear down the opponent or to counter the opponent's knee strike or kick.