Muay Thai and more in my thirties

At the Arnold Sports Festival in 2009, I met Forrest Griffin, an ex-UFC fighter and winner of one of the most epic MMA fights in history. 

Fast forward to my 30’s and I walk into my gym for a workout and notice a sign saying, “Sign up for Muay Thai classes.” By then, I had discovered many other martial arts beyond karate and kung fu movies. Although I have to admit my first introduction to Muay Thai was in Jean Claude Van Dam’s movie Bloodsport. The style of fighting and use of knees as well as elbows again fascinated me from years past. I also saw Tony Ja, who if you haven’t seen in the movie Ong-Bak: The Thai Warrior, you should because that man was insanely talented. When I saw that sign to try muay thai classes, the same light went off inside me that lit up in my younger self discovering karate movies for the first time. I needed to do that! So, I signed up and ended up studying muay thai for 3 ½ years.

I never competed in anything other than local sparring matches, but I did go to some competitions to watch and help corner others training in my gym. In 2009, I went to the Arnold Sports Festival in Columbus, OH with the rest of my gym’s fight team, which is an eclectic sports festival with boxing, bodybuilding, kickboxing, gymnastics, crossfit, and several other sports all mashed up together. The sports festival was the same weekend as a UFC fight in the same town, so the event had a ton of famous faces. I met several old school UFC fighters - Matt Hughes, Brandon Vera, Frank Trigg, and Forrest Griffin, among others.

Life changed for me in 2010 in a way that interrupted my muay thai training career when I had to take on another kind of fight - testicular cancer. After some surgery and chemo, I won that fight, but that sort of ordeal has a way of reprioritizing things a bit. After I recovered, I continued training for a while, but eventually I decided to focus my energy on building a life with my then girlfriend, who never left my side during my cancer battle. I stopped officially training muay thai, but I still practice it on my own even all these years later.

Me early in my muay thai training career. with hands low and head high, but I got better.