Just seen this today, amazing for a westerner especially at this age winning a Stadium title, must be the youngest westerner to win the title, this guy looks like he's gonna create an amazing legacy he'll be coming into his prime in a few more years I mean how many non Thai's have actually even won one ? [ame]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NqER_IkaZf8&feature=related[/ame]
I´m not sure, don´t remember if was only him, but a japanese named Fukuyama won it too in the 70s.....
Toshio Fujiwara in 1978 was the first foreigner to win a major stadium title(Rajadamnern Stadium). the others were Morad Sari (Lumpinee, 1999), Hitoshi Ogasawara (Rajadamnern, 2000), Kozo Takeda (Rajadamnern, 2001), Hiroki Ishii (Rajadamnern, 2011) and Damien Alamos being the most recent (Lumpinee earlier this year). I still think the best foreign muaythai fighter to fight in the stadiums was either Toshio Fujiwara or Danny Bill. Alamos is the first foreigner to successfully defend his title, he looks very good and may eventually prove to be the best of the lot. Danny Bill and Fujiwara were very good so its gonna take some doing.
Not a major Thai Stadium title. He won kings Cup tournaments and IMF title in Thailand. WMC title, he won a ton of titles in Australia and in Japan. More importantly Parr beat a lot of very good fighters. Absolutely :good
Damien Almos “The White Lion”, class act, pure quality & any foreigner fighter that joins that tiny elite list of fighters who have won a Lumpinee or Raja belt has to be considered in contention for foreign ATD status, although it is early days. (To the uninitiated the Lumpinee belt is the “real” world championship belt, way more prestigious and tougher to get than so called world championship belts. Probably on of the hardest titles to win in all of combat sports.:deal) Full respect to him & it's great to see a farang with a stadium belt. I love his style, pure Thai, great rhythm and balance. One of the interesting things about Almos as Wisdom already mentioned is his age, he’s only 22 had 61 bouts and has a Lumpinee belt already, based in Thailand now since around 2009(?) I think there’s a lot of great to come fights if he can stay at the weight or unless he switches to MMA like the Pinto bros have unfortunately done. (Wisdom you should check out the Pinto Bros, two French brothers raised in Thailand from the age of 6 when they started to train out there, they fight like Thais). Now, I’m gonna play devil’s advocate abit. :thedevil1 When judging the quality of farang fighters who win belts in Thailand you have to look at the weight division they’ve won the belt in. The 140lbs division is a weak division at the moment and is getting away from the more competitive end of Muay Thai in Thailand, but still a very valid division. Kongfah who Almos beats in that clip looks to be giving a lot of weight to the Frenchman and seems to be out of shape and dare I say it over the hill I believe he’d held the championship since 2008 which shows you the lack of competition at 140 in Thailand. 140 and above tends to house a lot of fighters who have had their heydays years before and are abit older and can’t squeeze into the lower weights anymore, but are too small to fight for the big money abroad. If a foreigner wins say a Lumpinee or Raja belt 130 or below, your jaw absolutely hits the floor……. :yikes Don’t get me wrong 140lbs is still a valid division, but lacking the competitiveness and depth of all the other lower weigh classes and anything above that well except for maybe 147 it’s very hard to find top class Thais in their primes and if they do exists a lot go on to fight abroad for the bigger money, think Kem, Buakaw, Singmanee etc. and soon to be Aikpreecha no doubt. A lot of sub 140 foreigner boxers who may very well be great great fighters get lost in the lower weight divisions due to the sheer weight of numbers of home grown fighters and super competitiveness nature of the Thai fight scene, it’s very hard for them to break out, unlike their slightly bigger contemporaries. There is also very little money internationally in the lower weights unlike to 70 kilo glamour division fighters who fight so regularly all over the world for sometimes very good money. However, that being said Farang boxers if they have skills (or not sometimes) do get to jump the que and that seems more possibly now than it ever was before. Although that can be a double edged sword, you can get thrown in too deep too quick sometimes! Who’s the greatest Farang ATG? Well in Thailand most Thais agree with Yaca and say Danny Bill. :bowdown By the way, Almos just got beat on the 12th of this month at Lumpinee in a non titlefight against Diesel Lek Udon Muang who Almos beat a year ago. Almos got beat pretty convincingly by a very experienced and dare I say it slightly out of shape Diesel Lek....... [ame]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_UAZb3UuHg0[/ame]
Did'nt Jean Charles win the Rajadamnern Stadium Title at middleweight how big and impressive of an achievement was/is that considered ?
Skarbowsky was a legend, proabably the best foreigner of his particular era especially when he came back in the late 90s. He did fight in the stadiums often, but as far as I recall he never held a stadium belt.....(Yaca?). Any farang fighting and holding his own in the 90s and early 2000s in a stadium fight is a great achievment.........but as he fought around the 60 -65kg area in his day, which as I stated above is getting well away from the more competitive end of Muay Thai in Thailand. You have to remember, you have three forms of MT: Farang vs Farang Farang vs Thai Thai vs Thai Thai vs Thai is eons above anything else. The gulf between the Thais and the rest is huge always has been and always will be. Very often when Thais fight farang they are giving weight and are probaby past thier best. Not always and of course there are some great farang but they are the exception not the norm. I'm not dissing farang fighters who compete very well all things considered, but on the whole it's not a level playing field. Just a side note, I know JWP beat Skarbowsky late in his career, but imagine Skarbowsky vs JWP around the year 2000....wow.:yep PS: Wisdom, I haven't forgotten your PM I'm gonna answer it, but I've got a bit of a PM backlog.......
What would you say is the western fighters biggest weakness against Thai's is it the clinch in particular or is it just every overall skillset except punching
John Wayne Parr vs Orono rematch on Kings birthday, December 5 2000 for IMF World title >>> [ame]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qAgeoUL0w2Y[/ame]
Yeah Alamos lost pretty clearly in that fight. It's probable that these guys will fight at least one more time hopefully for the title. Diesel Lek maybe the fav but Alamos has some dangerous power in his left hook. Will be a good fight if/when it happens.
I was there at Sanam Luang, saw it live. A great night of boxing packed with massive ATG names not to mention that was the night Somrak had his first MT come back and made Kamel look like a novice. I'll never forget the night cos I'd been hanging a little with Coban before the fights. :bowdown JWP......always a class act. I hope OZ realise and appreciate what a warrior you guys gave the world! :deal I agree, looks like things are hotting up nicely for the rubber......Although we wanna see belts on the line! :yep
