Warm-up exercises and stretching.
Just like any kind of martial arts or any other kind of sports. Lack of proper warm up and stretching process will leads to negative impact to the body, which may happen during the training session/competition and after. The most important key elements of the body that should be focused for Muay Thai training warm up process are muscles and joints. Please also note that warm up and stretching process are vary depends on camps and instructors, the following instruction is fundamental but effective for any kind of sport training. You have to take warm up session at least 20 minutes but should not be longer than half an hour.

Now you are ready to start to warm up. Let’s concentrate on warm up and stretching joints of the body.

Joints warm up

a) Knees (หมุนเข่า): As we are going to use knees a lot during the training in order to generate effective movement. Also, knees themselves are one of the basic weapons of Muay Thai, especially when clinching. However, unfortunately knees are also one of the weakest joints that can be easily attacked. The knees warm up can be done by bend down your knees put your hands on the top of both knees then rotate knees round and round repeatedly about 20 up to 30 times.

b) Ankles (หมุนข้อเท้า): Ankle are also very important joints for Muay Thai training. Even though we do not use ankle for kick attack (Muay Thai uses shins for kick attack). Exercise ankles by raise your heels and rotate ankles in circle about 10-20 times

c) Waist (หมุนเอว) : Waist is very important part when clinching, effective waist warm up will reduce chance for damage of muscles. Put your hands on the waist, then waist to the left 10 times and twist right 10 times.

d) Neck (หมุนคอ): When clinching, opponent will try to grab your neck in order to use knee attack. Proper neck exercise will help to protect sprain and muscle damage. Put your hand on the waist and move your face vertically and horizontally 10-20 times each.

Muscle relax and warm up
Muscle relaxation is compulsory for Muay Thai training. We use a lot of muscles during training. In Thailand, boxer normally use special kind of hot oil, generally known as Nam Man Muay slightly apply on skin to make muscles stay active. However, using hot oil is not compulsory for training and boxers do not allowed to apply excessive hot oil on the body during Muay Thai competition.

Hamstrings
There are two main figures to exercise hamstrings
The first figure is intend to relax and warm up triceps of legs and ankles. This figure is actually quite basic but very effective.

Stand-up figure: stand firmly and keep legs a bit apart from each other. Bend over and put your hands to touch the floor. Stay still with that figure for about ten seconds and repeat the whole process up to 3-5 times.

Sit-down figure: sit down on the floor and stretch one leg forward. If you stretch left leg bend over and use your left hand grab the ankle firmly and stay with that figure for about ten second (same as stand-up figure). Do the same pattern with the right leg.

Note: if you feel a bit pain at hamstrings when you bend over, this is normal but if you feel too much pain, do not continue and you have to do it slower in order for your hamstrings to be ready for exercise.

By Isara Sukgrarongka