FAQ

Muay Thai is the national sport of Thailand, a combat sport with origins in the ancient battlefield tactics of the Siamese army. It combines punches, kicks, elbow and knee strikes, and so is nicknamed the “art of eight limbs.” Muay Thai is a practical fighting style that utilizes the entire body and is an effective art for exercise and self-defense.

This is a lengthy topic but in short, competition kickboxing has more rules than Muay Thai. In kickboxing, depending on the promotion, there may be no clinch or a very short 2-3 second clinch, there are no elbows, you cannot throw your opponent and you cannot catch leg kicks.

In full Muay Thai rules everything is allowed – clinch, elbows, knees, sweeps, throws and catching kicks or knees are allowed.

These differences tend to affect certain techniques and strategies during training and fighting.

We offer a free trial class Monday, Tuesday, Thursday at 6PM and 7:15PM. You can schedule a class by emailing us here.

A free trial class is available for Illinois residents who are interested in trying out one of our classes to determine whether our gym is the right fit. If you are from out of town and are looking for a session or two, we offer a drop in class which is $30.

For your first class – bring comfortable workout clothes, a water bottle and boxing gloves if you have them. We recommend wearing a t-shirt and shorts. If you do not have boxing gloves we can loan a pair for the first class!

Yes we accept people of all levels from beginners to professionals. While we follow a teaching curriculum our instructors scale classes depending on who is in class.

Our classes are a combination of bag work, pad work, situational drills, calisthenics, footwork drills, technique, and voluntary sparring.

Our fundamentals classes do have a lot of conditioning from time to time but we encourage everyone to attend and go at their own pace.

We do spar and we are a gym that prepares, trains, coaches and corners fighters for competition. Sparring is voluntary and commensurate with experience. Sparring also has to be approved by one of our instructors. During sparring you will need to have appropriate head gear, 16 oz. gloves a mouthpiece and shin guards.

We also spar at various gyms around the Chicago area for additional experience and greater exposure of talent around the city.

In short, yes it is possible. However this is a long discussion and it really depends on your martial arts background, previous training and fight experience, and current commitment to training for competition.

If you are interested in competing please contact us.

Currently we do not offer a kid’s program at our school. Our classes are for adults only. We are hoping to add a program for minors in the near future.

The main difference is that all of our instructors have either trained or fought in Thailand or both. We are the only gym in Chicago that has instructors who have fought multiple times in Lumpini Stadium.

Additionally we are connected to a top non-tourist Muay Thai fight camp owned by the multiple world champion Sangtiennoi Sor Rungroj – which is the Sangtiennoi Muay Thai Gym in Pathum Thani that is located right outside of Bangkok.

We maintain close contact with many other top trainers and fighters with whom we train with and arrange seminars for here in the United States.

Having close contact and connections with real Thai camps truly allows us to keep our skills up to date, relevant and representative of true and authentic Muay Thai technique which we pass on to our students.

Additionally, we are extremely active and connected to the Muay Thai community in the United States through competition, serving as judges during competitions, working as corner men and acting as coaches for fighters.

Yes, we have connections with a few non-tourist Muay Thai camps, most notably with the Sangtiennoi Muay Thai Gym. We can advise, guide or arrange for you to train in Thailand. We feel that there is a difference in the quality of training between tourist gyms and non-tourist gyms and therefore your experience may vary greatly depending on where and with whom you train with. We can speak more on this topic in the gym or you can contact us.

We try to keep our pricing transparent, affordable, straightforward and simple. Please view our pricing page for more information. If you have any other questions about pricing please feel free to contact us.