Muay Thai Boxing in Bangkok — With the owner of the gym after our workout.

Thai boxing in Bangkok ~ Oh My!

Is Muay Thai also known as Thai boxing on your adventure list? The martial art form of Muay Thai is HUGE in Thailand. It’s very popular in the U.S. as well. Part of the comprehensive travel experience created by our hosts at the Tourism Authority of Thailand (TAT) was to visit Krudam Gym for a morning lesson of Muay Thai.

Kenzee, my private trainer at Equinox in Pasadena was thrilled that I could “enjoy” an authentic experience in this sport while I was in Thailand. I was aware that they teach Thai boxing at my gym and it definitely seems challenging. I have taken kickboxing classes before, but it has been years.

The wear and tear on my knees from decades of tennis, workouts, classes and bootcamps, running, walking and stairclimbing gradually wore out the meniscus in my right knee this year. I had surgery and I am good as new but leery of any crazy athletic out-of-the-ordinary sporting endeavors.

However, as they say, when in Rome (or Thailand)… I wanted to be a trooper, join the group and experience this workout for myself. It feels good to bring out that inner badass, doesn’t it?

Yes it was hard, really hard

OMG! This was a workout like no other. We arrived at 8:30am to the open-walled gym and the air was a cool 80 degrees with high humidity. I began to sweat before I hit the mat. Yay! We were greeted by nine, enthusiastic boxing experts eager to assist and teach us their beloved sport.

We started with stretching (so far so good), we moved on to running around the gym (good, but starting to worry) then it was time to get serious. We finished the running part and now it was time for the five minutes of jump rope. FIVE MINUTES? Have you jumped rope for five minutes straight? This was just the warm up! I was traveling with a fit group of younger women and my intimidation quotient was very high.

I tried to pretend like I wasn’t worried and kept telling myself, how hard can this be? I am fit, I can do this! Let me tell you friends, this is a challenging, full body work out, but ultimately I really enjoyed it!

We really did have a blast!

After stretching, my teacher/partner wrapped my hands with tape and helped me on with my gloves. We followed the instructor through left hand jabs, right hand jabs, elbow somethings and two kinds of kicks. We pounded the pads as well as the enormous punching bags.

It was intense, intimidating, sweaty, incredibly challenging and the young men who taught us couldn’t have been more gracious and helpful. Truthfully, near the end of class my acid reflux (how lovely) was acting up and I didn’t feel very well, but it subsided eventually and the glow of accomplishment returned.