Combining the ranges in Muay Thai (diary entry)

10.07.17   Tonight was my client’s penultimate lesson in Basic Muay Thai for Martial Arts Cross Training.  We looked at bringing everything together from the previous lessons before the final lesson where Muay Thai is brought back to the self-defence line of instruction. Tonight’s focus was in combining punches, elbows, knees and kicks along with the clinch.   We began with mobility exercises, dynamic stretches and calisthenics moving on mirror footwork. We then did some impact conditioning and movement through basic techniques before building up our clinch-work. Clinch began with neck-wrestling, followed by light Thai clinch sparring, which was interspersed with drills for new locking-off, trapping and breakaway tactics.   The next section consisted of combination work on the Thai focus mitts. Here we looked at various offensive and counter-offensive combinations, including shin-checks, which mixed punching/kicking range with clinch-range. The lesson finished with a round of sparring.