FIGHT DIARY
RYON’s AMATEUR DEBUT
AT THE
UNITED STATES MUAY THAI OPEN
Good morning from the USMTOs in sunny Mesa, Arizona.
Wednesday April 19, 2023 : TRAVEL DAY
It was a grueling 12 hour drive where we only stopped once to refuel (unless you count all the stop and go in LA). We left at 10:25am Wednesday and arrived at our Airbnb at 10:25pm.
Thursday April 20, 2023 : WEIGH-IN DAY
It another long day. Around 10:00am Ryon put on his sweat suit, Jumped rope (three 6-min rounds with 1-min rests), Shadowboxed (three 2-min rounds with 1-min rests), and then did pad work (three 90-sec rounds with 1-min rests), all this on a piece of bread and half a Crystal Geyser bottle.
With weigh-ins about an hour away, after a quick rinse off in the shower, Ryon was lean and mean and ready to fall right under that 106.0lb max (FYI Ryon walks around at 106, so he didn’t cut, he just dieted for a few weeks). But there must have been something in the air on this sunny 4/20 afternoon because it didn’t go as planned… The head coach aka Dad, didn’t remember to bring Ryon to get a physical before heading to Arizona… NO PHYSICAL / NO FIGHT. SMH
Getting stopped outside the registration building for not showing all required paperwork sucked. This really helpful staff member of the SIAM promotion team, was being really helpful and gave us two options:
OPTION #1: Wait 3-hours until the doctor arrives to the weigh-ins and fall in line with all the other people who didn’t do physical, or
OPTION #2: Go off-site to a clinic to get a physical done and come back with the required signed form.
After speaking to another coach I know from the Bay Area, we rushed over to a close by clinic where he brought his fighters. They were quick and saved $30 compared to the $130 that the on-site doctor was going to be charging later at 4:00pm. Went over to 1st Family Care, got last time slot with the Nurse Practitioner, and headed back to the weigh-ins right at 4:00pm. Showed the front staff member all the paperwork and was allowed to enter the building to officially register and finally weigh-in.
But of course that didn’t happen. The USMTO official at the scale rejected the physical, stating: “You got this signed by a NP, it has to be signed by a MD only!” Sorry, you can pay to get the in-house doctor to do a proper physical. HOLY SHIKES! Did I just pay $100 for nothing, and now going to have to have Ryon wait a few more hours before he can eat (it’s now been over 6-hours since the morning bread), and have to pay another $130!? Went immediately to find the staff member who told me to go off-site, amongst a packed room of lines, scales and medical checks, and he said: “No, I got you!”, took our paperwork and was able to get a onsite medical examiner to do a quick RE-examination and signed the same form. We were now ready to weigh in.
Now 5:00pm, we were walking out of there, with Ryon officially registered at 105lbs. Grabbed dinner at Joyride Tacos in Gilbert (nasty, don’t go there) and went back to the house.
Friday, April 21, 2023 : COMPETITION DAY ONE
Woke up at 6:00am and found they updated the bracket at 2:00am. One of the fighters in Ryon’s division dropped out so only 4 total. That means the all advance to the semifinal round which will take place on Saturday. Ryon is fight 112. Tomorrow the first fight is fight 74, so he will be 38 fights in. Looks like it will happen around 12:00pm - 1:00pm. Will update then. We have other fighters from our home gym Valor Training Center, with one fighter having to fight today. So we will be supporting him. Let’s see how this competition looks!
Went by the fights and Ryon saw the kid he’s going to fight. They look about the same height, looks like the kid is from a decent gym… but it is a MMA gym… So we expect spinning attacks and for him to be aggressive. An adult from the kids gym, had a pretty impressive KO win early in the day.