The Guy Who Wanted a Spinning Back Kick
A week ago a Summit guy walked into open mat at All Star and asked if I could teach him a spinning back kick before his buddy’s bachelor party. Said his cousin does one on TikTok that gets 200k views. I told him sure, we’ll get to it eventually, but first let’s talk about what actually happens if someone squares up on you outside a bar on Springfield Ave, or grabs your arm in a parking garage after you’ve had two drinks and you’re not thinking straight.
That’s not a spinning back kick situation. That’s a clinch situation. That’s an elbow-and-knee-at-close-range situation. And that’s the whole reason I’ve built our adult program around real Muay Thai instead of the highlight-reel version people see online.
What Looks Good vs. What Works
I spent six years fighting professionally — IFL, Bellator, UWC where I won the light heavyweight title — and I can tell you the fights that actually got ugly were never decided by anybody’s flying knee. They got decided in the clinch, in the scramble, in the two seconds where somebody grabbed onto you and you had to know what to do with your hands, your elbows, your hips.
Instagram rewards the pretty stuff. Cartwheel kicks, 540s, tornado spins. Cool to watch, useless if a guy who outweighs you by 40 pounds bull-rushes you in a tight space. Real Muay Thai — the stuff I learned coming up and still teach here — is built around three ranges: long range with the teep and low kick to keep people off you, mid-range boxing to control distance, and the clinch, where elbows and knees do the actual damage when things get close. Parking lots are close. Doorways are close. Most real altercations happen at a range where a spin kick would get you knocked out before you finished rotating.
Why August Is the Month to Start This
Right now half of Summit is doing back-to-school shopping at the mall on Springfield Ave, and the other half is squeezing in one more vacation before September calendars fill up with school pickups, fall sports, and work ramping back up. That makes August the best window all year to build something before your schedule owns you again.
Muay Thai conditions you fast. Round-based training on pads, heavy bag work, clinch rounds — your gas tank improves in three weeks, not three months. I’ve had guys from Cranford and Westfield tell me they stopped getting winded carrying groceries up a flight of stairs after a month of consistent training. That’s not marketing, that’s just what happens when you’re doing five-minute rounds twice a week.
And unlike a lot of summer fitness fads, this isn’t something you drop in October. Once fall hits and schedules get tight, the guys who started in August already have the habit built. They’re not starting from zero when the weather turns.
What a First Class Actually Looks Like
No one’s throwing you into sparring on day one. You show up, we get you wrapped or gloved up, and we start with pad work — teeps, straight punches, low kicks — so you learn the tools before you’re ever asked to use them against resistance. Then some clinch work against a partner, controlled, where you learn how to fight for position instead of just throwing knees wildly. That clinch work is the part most gyms skip because it’s not flashy, and it’s exactly the part that matters if somebody actually grabs you.
I’ve got professionals from Summit who come straight from the train after work, guys from Union on their lunch break, a few Millburn dads who train while their kids are at travel practice. Nobody’s there to look cool. They’re there because it works and because the room doesn’t care what you looked like before you walked in.
The Honest Answer for the Nervous 35-Year-Old
If you’re 35, haven’t trained anything since high school wrestling, and you’re worried you’ll be the slowest guy in the room — you won’t be, because I put beginners with beginners for the live rounds and I’m on the mat watching every session. Nobody’s sparring full speed in week one. You’ll be sore in places you forgot you had muscles, and by week three you’ll notice you’re not gassed walking up the stairs at the Summit train station anymore.
The self-defense part isn’t a separate class we bolt on. It’s baked into every round of pad work and every clinch rep. You’re not learning choreography you’ll forget in a month. You’re building reflexes — keep your hands up, control the distance, know what to do if someone gets a hold of you — that stay with you whether you train for six months or six years.
Come Try It Before September Fills Up
I’m not going to tell you Muay Thai will change your life. I’ll tell you it’ll make you harder to grab, harder to knock down, and in better shape than you’ve been since you stopped playing whatever sport you played in college. That’s it. That’s the pitch.
Drop into a free Adult Muay Thai class this week at our Union gym. Fifteen minutes from Summit, easy parking, no contract pressure, no gimmicks. Call (908) 341-1131 and I’ll get you on the schedule myself.
