Report : Traditional Thai Fighting Arts

Mae Mai & Look Mai Muay Thai
The secret forms of Muay Boran

Text: Marco de Cesaris
Courtesy: Budo International Magazine

Part one : The origins

In order to preserve what was about to be forgotten, the heritage of Siamese traditional fighting arts, now better known as Muay Thai Boran, the higher directors of Thai Ministry of Education gave instructions to the National Culture Commission to regroup and put in order as much as possible of the technical repertoire of the ancient Thai Martial Art. This restoration effort gave birth to the formulation of study programs and a complete technical progression that could also be used outside the borders of Thailand in order to help students around the world in learning the true Siam warrior Art, in the best possible way and not a watered-down version.

The result of the codification work done by the Masters called together by the director of the Culture Commission at the time (early 90’), Mr. Payungsak Jantrasurin, under the guidance of the top technical authority in the matter, the Grand Master and university professor Paosawat Saengsawan, led to the subdivision of all the Traditional Muay Thai empty-hand martial techniques into the five groups listed below.

The first group of principles and techniques, denominated Chern Muay, incorporates the methods for the correct use of the natural weapons of the human body (hands, feet, shins, knees, elbows, and head) to attack various sensitive parts of the body of the adversary: the attacks can be direct or preceded by a feint or executed in combination.

The second group refers to the defensive actions that can be used to counter the various upper and lower body attacks: we name those techniques Kon Muay.
The third groups puts together defence and counter attacks in a lot of single strikes and combinations: we refer to this section as Kon Muay Kee techniques.

The fourth group is an Art in itself and is called Muay Pram: it refers to all the techniques of work at short distance, namely grappling and striking or throwing, in which the fighter specializes in percussion techniques with elbows, knees, head while holding or trapping the opponent, joint-breaking and throwing techniques.
The last two groups involve the techniques, the strategies, and the methods of use of the fundamental principles of Muay Thai Boran: the 15 basic techniques of Muay Thai are denominated Mae Mai Muay Thai (or Mai Khruu), and the 15 complimentary fighting techniques are denominated Look Mai Muay Thai (or Mai Kred).

Both Mae Mai Muay Thai and Look Mai Muay Thai techniques have been codified in a precise order, and the new student would have to learn them in accord with the set sequence, going from the simplest techniques to the most complex in order to build solid bases before being able to go more deeply into the most adequate strategies for his own morphology and psychological characteristics.

As with many other traditional Martial Arts “forms”, Mae Mai and Look Mai Muay Thai are susceptible of different “readings” going from a superficial point of view to deeper and more lethal interpretations.

If, in fact, a superficial reading of those forms seems to give information about offensive and defensive movements only, with a more attentive examination, under the guidance of a true Muay Boran expert, they become an exceptional source of indispensable notions for martial combat, until today jealously guarded and never completely revealed to Western students.

These technical sequences, whose codification goes back, according to some specialists, to the XVIIIth century, teach us, for example, the system necessary to develop indispensable skills such as the choice of timing in the student’s action of attack or defence, from the first training sessions; furthermore, they teach us how to train the sense of distance, an element related to the previous point, with offensive or defensive objectives (we could also see the emphasis given to the study of this element in the techniques belonging to the mysterious Hanuman style, the mythical White Monkey); they supply us with a map of the sensitive and vital points of the human body, along with the angles that must be used for striking them in a more devastating way; in conclusion, they indicate in a precise way what natural weapons (hands, feet, shins, head, elbows, knees) to use to obtain the greatest effect when we attack the different targets previously identified.

Furthermore, each Mae Mai and each Look Mai has to be studied not only in its basic, codified form, but also in its principle variations (from 3 to 6 variations for each form), and must be applied with one or more combined techniques, called by some Thai Masters “devastating combinations”. In all, the basic forms and the variations come to over 150 and represent the true technical platform of the style currently in use among members of the IMBA.

For us westerners, the study of these principles and groups of techniques is practically an inexhaustible source of martial information of tremendous value, useful firstly for anyone interested in accumulating solid technical knowledge for self-defence, secondly for the trainers of professional athletes who, through Mae Mai and Look Mai, can enormously improve the technical quality of their own students with short and long term benefits.

Thanks to the Grand Masters of the International Association AITMA (Association Institute of Thai Martial Arts) with headquarters in Bangkok, directly supervised by the Culture Commission of Thailand, especially Grand Master Paosawat and Grand Master Woody and the IMBA (International Muay Boran Academy), the international organization headed by the Italian Arjarn Marco De Cesaris, Western practitioners today can learn about these precious notions in a way that has never been possible until now. Finally we can go more deeply into the traditions of true Thai martial combat, apparently simple but in reality truly complex.

Part two: the traditional Mae Mai competitions

As we have provided evidence for in our most recent reports from Thailand, the fashion of competitions based on elements of the Siamese martial tradition is, in fact, exploding in the motherland of Muay Thai. It is with pride that we can affirm that International Muay Boran Academy together with AITMA has had an important role in the re-discovery and valuation of an enormous technical and cultural background that, according to the very Thai authorities, have been in decline for years and practically on the verge of being lost. For that, it was natural that the athletes of the IMBA were among the first to be officially invited to take part in the international open competitions—that have been reserved to thai people for the first editions—in the most suggestive places of Thailand, directed by the country’s Culture Commission and, most recently, organized by the AITMA, the international body founded to help the preservation and the development of the Thai martial traditions.

In order to also be competitive under the “professional” profile, during these technical competitions, denominated “prearranged fights with the use of traditional Mae Mai and Look Mai Muay Thai techniques”, during this year the IMBA technicians have promoted numerous meetings among the European members (Italians, English, Spanish, German, Dutch, Belgian, Romanian, Swiss, Austrian and French) to improve the provisions of the athletes who must compete with their Thai colleagues during the international championships, like the last one disputed last year in Ayuddaya, the old capital of the Siam Kingdom.

Now we are going to look at some of the elements that can “make the difference” in terms of scoring on the judges cards during an execution of Mae Mai.

• Utilizing sophisticated movements to neutralize various kinds of attacks, like, for example, the defensive movements who can, in a single action, defend the attack and strike back. It’s clear that for each Kon Muay Kee action—that means, each defensive and counterattack technique—there are innumerable technical possibilities among which the athlete can choose on the basis of his own skill and knowledge of the matter. Furthermore, it is also clear that for better performance (and a higher score), technical solutions that demonstrate a great domination of the discipline are preferred.

• Executing the techniques in a realistic, correct and efficient way, also in the case of athletes with different sizes and weights: for example, we must study how to efficiently avoid circular kicks, moving backward on a diagonal line in order to react while advancing on a shorter straight line. When one chooses an action, especially a defence for his routine, it is important to keep in mind the fact that the traditional fight with ropes, Muay Kard Chiek, or, without ropes (in a preceding epoch), was done among athletes of very distinct weights, the opposite of what now occurs in ring sports. A consequence of this is that some strategies and techniques, especially checks, blocks, and throws, in use today are not very appropriate for confronting adversaries who are much heavier than we are; for that, it’s important that when techniques are chosen to be included into the Mae Mai routines, we verify whether they respond to this requisite that, without a doubt, the judges value very highly.

• It is also important introducing spectacular and efficient movements taken from the Hanuman style in the technical routine: for example, in the oldest forms, there are many jumping knee and elbow strikes executed from the medium and short distances, often surprising the opponent who is not accustomed to these devastating actions. Often the spectacular aspect is not synonymous with efficiency, but in many actions of the Muay Boran styles that have specialized in “strange” and surprising techniques, like the famous Hanuman style (the mythical White Monkey), one can find a wise combination of the two aforementioned elements, the spectacular and the efficient. In the majority of cases, the one who prepares a Mae Mai routine keeps the Hanuman elements for the last part of the performance, gradually increasing the difficulty of the technical executions so as to arrive at the hypothetical conclusion of the fight precisely with an attack taken from the technical base of that style. It’s also clear that the judges expect that at least one of those techniques will be included in the execution of the routine, and it often happens that the way in which one combines them with the rest of the actions favours the scoring of the whole exercise.

In conclusion, we can say that the correct preparation for participating in a traditional Mae Mai Muay Thai competition, not only provides a notable development of technical and athletic skills, but is also the most efficient method to dominate—also in real combat—actions that are potentially very dangerous if not trained with attention, and which reveal to us the very essence of a truly martial method like Muay Boran.