Well hello fellow bloggers and blog readers. As most of you know by now I had my fight last Friday. No doubt most of you have seen the video so you know the outcome of the fight but if not, then just keep reading.

It was such a mental week last week before the fight. I mean mentally draining. It took quite a bit out of me and I'm sure I was not being my normal happy self. It's a tough thing preparing for a fight in your own country let alone another one. Also you have to remember your playing there game in there back garden. So all these mental challenges you have just drain your mind. It's tough for sure. I have not fought full contact with no protection before. Neither have I been able to knee or elbow anyones face before and get away with it. Also the other guy is trying to do the same to me so it's an odd thought. Thursday nights sleep was very restless. My brain was on constant overdrive. Visualisation was my worst enemy that night. I would think of every counter attack, every angle of elbow I could throw, every knee I could attack with and also when to throw my favourite kick...the head kicks. It was a long night that one.

Friday morning and I woke up fairly relaxed. I had kept dreaming of the Wai Kru that I had to do before my fight. I'm pretty sure I had memorised it all now. I had a 1 hour private with my trainer Ritt the night before and I had recorded it to watch back. I had watched it over 5 times before I fell asleep. Friday morning after a good breakfast I headed over to the ring and ran through it a few times. I had pulled my left leg the night before doing a certain move in the Wai Kru. It was still hurting and kept playing on my mind. Headed for a big lunch and went back home for some beauty sleep. We all met up at Baan Suan for Nics leaving meal. Another member has left. I said my goodbyes and headed over to the camp to catch the minibus to the stadium. I was still feeling quite relaxed but curious to see who I would be fighting. I knew it would be a Thai but how big, how strong and at what level was he. All these things kept my mind ticking. 

We arrived at Bangla Stadium in Patong. The stadium is above a very lively night club by the look of it. Went up stairs to the stadium and saw the ring. It started to feel more real now and my game head was switched on as soon as I made eye contact with the ring. We headed up to the top floor where all the fighters get ready. Straight away Ritt sat me down and started wrapping my hands. He also pointed out who I would be fighting. For some reason my mind told me that he was a lot bigger than I had imagined. He was just a bit shorter than me but had wide shoulders and big legs. My first thoughts were that he had strong leg kicks and solid punches. As Ritt was wrapping my hands I was just thinking about the wai kru. I was using it to try and keep me calm, it was working. The wraps were solid and it felt great to have them done properly. It was like confirmation that I was about to have a real Muay Thai fight in Thailand. I stripped down and put on my fight shorts. Lay down on the wooden table and the cornermen oiled me up. They use a boxing oil that heats up all your muscles. I've used it before here and it burns quite a bit. They massage you down and rub the oil in deep so it gets right into your muscles to warm them up. They then told me to do some shadow boxing to loosen up. The other fighter was 5 meters behind me doing the same thing. He looked like he had been doing this a while. I was right. I found out after the fight that he had over 100 fights. Glad they told me that after. They play pipes and drums whilst you do the wai kru and whilst your fighting. That's all I could hear. James and the boys were there but I was so focused I couldn't really talk much. Just listened to the pipes, visulised the fight and got tips from Tigers photographer, Robin. He has seen so many fights so he was able to give me some really good advice about Kulaphet (the guy I was fighting). When the fight before me was just about to start I got on my gloves. They are 8oz gloves and felt so light compared to the 16oz gloves I've been using everyday. They put on the Tiger Muay Thai gown and headband. I felt like I was about to go into some ancient battle. I was relaxed and calm. I think I was more relaxed than the boys who came to watch. As I sat outside the ring waiting for the other fight to finish I had random people coming up to me and asking for pictures. Quite a surreal feeling. My heart started beating faster as the fight before was finishing.

My time was now. Fight time. I stepped into the ring to the name Spuard from England. I got a nice little clap from the crowd as well as a loud cheer from my boys. Thanks guys, I heard you well. Wai Kru time. Me and Kulaphet both did the same dance. I was not as fluid as I would have liked but it sure did help with the nerves. If I could get through a routine dance in front of around 300 people then I knew I would be able to relax more during the fight. After I got back to my corner and they removed my headgear I knew this was it. I was about to have myself a real fight.

The first round went well. I knew this guy was a bit wild and would throw things from weird angles and do odd things to throw me off. I pushed him back the whole time to try and put him off insted. It seemed to work as he seemed a bit flustered by my style. I got him with a grazing head kick and that put him on the back foot for the rest of the round. I caught a couple of kicks and sweeped the other leg. I hit him with a couple of solid jabs and I could feel his face through the glove. I kinda felt bad, but I didn't stop me trying to do it again. He was a scrappy guy and kept trying to come at me with kicks and odd running elbows. He was always just out of my range to catch me with anything though. The round ended and I headed back to my corner. They told me to just keep doing what I was doing but to mix up the kicks a bit. Also to try and go for more bodyshots. The bell rang and we met at the center of the ring again. I backed him up to a corner and caught him with a knee to the gut. I knew he was finding it hard to get inside of my range. I kept him where I was happy. He ended up getting a body lock around me which Robin had warned me about. I tried pushing his head away and throwing a hard elbow, it just grazed the top of his head but he let go with one arm. With his other arm pinned under mine I pushed his head away to the side and threw a roundhouse style knee to his head, it connected hard right next to his temple. I felt it all the way through my knee and leg. He dropped and almost fell out the ring. I had won my first Muay Thai fight by KO. I was super happy but still very relaxed. It is the strangest feeling fighting. It's a very lonely place. Just you and the guy your scrapping with. I was so focused on him that I couldn't get his face out of my head until the next day. I said thank you to him and his cornermen and then had my hand raised by the ref. It was done. I had won. As soon as I had all my thoughts had come back and the biggest feeling of joy came over me. I could relax at last. I had picked up a couple of knocks and my knee was throbing a lot but the pain was worth it. I could sit back and enjoy the last couple of fights before we headed out for celebration drinks. Ritt was very happy with me and said I had a beautiful knee. That felt very good to hear. Knowing that my trainer has pushed me hard and I've performed well.

We hopped into a taxi and headed into Patong center for drinks. I did have to sit on Daves lap though which neither of us were impressed by, although I do think he got a kick out of it really. That first whisky and coke felt so good. At most bars there is a bell you can ring and if you do it means you have to pay 1000 baht (£22) and everyone who is in that bar gets a free shot. Being the cowboy he is, Dave The Grenade couldn't resist ringing that bell, I'm sure it was for nostalgic reasons but it was also the most expensive shot he had ever bought, so he did it twice and bought another round of shots for the boys too. Very generous cowboy that night. Thanks Grenade. After feeling quite jolly I noticed that my bum was infact killing, along with my knee and shin. So much for the myth of alchol soothing the pain....that's just a cheap cob off for alcholics. Headed home at about 5am feeling very tired and beat up.

Saturday morning I was up early. So I headed for a swim in the pool and some breakfast at Baan Suan. Yuiii was very happy that I had one and gave me extra egg for being a winner, bless her. We ended up down at Nai Harn beach and stayed there the whole day. Dave, woody and me ended up talking so much rubbish that day that we think we have all infact turned a bit insane. I think staying around the camp for so long has the effect to turn people a bit mental. As I was swimming along with Dave a random man and his family had recoqnised my tattoos and said to me that he enjoyed watching my fight and congratulations. What a nice feeling that was. Nice to know the tats stand out too. That evening we decided to go and watch the new Twighlight film. Now let me clear this up before hand. I have not seen the other movies but I was told they were good by Woody, Dave and James. So with there approval of the other movies I thought I would go watch the film. That film was the gayest, crapiest and worst acted film I have ever seen. 5 minutes action and 10 days worth of gayness wrapped into 1.5 hours. My manlyness points I had won for my fight had just been deducted and the other boys had also lost all manly points for even suggesting the film to me. They also felt a new level of gay after watching that horse crap film. So as you can tell, we did not enjoy it one bit. Sunday was pretty much the same, sat by the pool for hours and talked a load of rubbish. We all felt pretty mental at this point. Dave and I decided to head up to Big Buddha at night time. We sat on a rock overlooking the Buddha and just chatted about normal things for once. On the way back down the hill we decided to shut off our bikes and just free roll in the darkness. I seen this little flashing light but it kept moving around so we stopped to take a gander. It was infact a firefly or as Dave calls it, a lightening bug. We watched in awe for about 5 mins as the little fella just flew around. Was our first ever viewing of the lightening bug show and we were both impressed by it's performance. 

Monday day we headed to the local zoo as it was a super hot day. We wanted to have our pics taken with the big tiger down there. When we got to the tiger though I had second thoughts. That cat was p i s s e d off and kept growling and eyeing up Dave. I think he actually thought he was going to get eaten. James, Dave and I all had our piccys taken with the big p**** cat and then with the cub also, that was more my size of cat but it was still fully capable of ripping my face off.  night was Deano's and Anders fights at Patong stadium. Both boys had real tough fights. Anders is only 16 but is built like a house. He fought 3 hard rounds and got caught with a lot of nasty elbows. One cut his head but it didn't phase him and he kept moving forward. He finally caught the guy with a hard right hand and dropped him. Deano's fight was also a tough one. The guy came out with leg kicks from hell and punished Deano for 4 rounds and the ref put a stop to it. Deano showed a huge amount of heart to keep coming back out of the corner each round. He took a lot more punishment than most people ever would. One tough Kiwi. 

Tuesday Dave and I headed over to Phi Phi island for a spot of sightseeing. After one boat trip and seeing sights we jumped onto another boat for some snorkelling. As thrilling as it was, it was also a pretty bad place to be at this time of year. The little slimy stingy things known as jellyfish were out in form sharing the same spot we were. Some poor people felt the wrath of there evilness. I was going to offer to wee on him but I didn't want him to think I was taking advantage of his bad luck. I would of done it and not thought anything of it....maybe. We jumped back on the boat and headed onto the main land for some lunch. We found an amazing beach there also so we swam in the shallow, crystal blue sea and just soaked up the hot rays and beautiful scenery around us. Did a bit of shopping and headed back to the boat like a bunch of cattle. Was a very nice day and real nice place to see. I recommend it for sure. 

Thursday we headed down to the stairs at the viewpoint for another gruelling workout led by the Woodster. More backwards bear crawls up stairs and other evil things that the mind of Woody could come up with. We then finished off with running down the steep twisty hill and back up again followed by hill sprints. Sure did feel the burn that session.....literatly!! I'm burnt like a fresh bit of English meat again. I thought my body was over this burning business but clearly not. I'm back at the muay thai ring training again now. Found out I will be fighting again on the 23rd of July. So prep time once again. Get over a few little injuries before then I hope and I will be good to go. 

Sorry for this extremely long blog today. I had a lot to write about but hope you enjoyed Reading it. Over and out. Stu