3 Unorthodox Training Tools For Muay Thai

ADDING UNCONVENTIONAL TOOLS TO YOUR HOME GYM

By Matt Filart

We’ve been talking all about different pieces of equipment that you can add to your home gym. We’ve talked about heavy bags, free standing bags and more specialized bags that any nak muay can get a ton of training out of from the comfort of their own home. 

But sometimes these pieces of equipment can be expensive, and you might not be able to set them up where you live for various reasons. You might already have some of the equipment we’ve talked about and want to spice up your training a bit. For whatever reason you might be in the market for some new training equipment for your home gym.

So, we went ahead and made a list of a few pieces of training equipment that any nak muay could use to add to their at home training. Check it out!

#1: Agility Ladder

This is a piece of training equipment that you've seen a lot of soccer players, football players and Western boxers use a lot. Us nak muays can get a ton of use out of them as well!

One weakness that I see in a lot of Muay Thai practitioners is their lack of footwork and movement. Most of us are flat-footed and tend to stick to only moving forwards and backwards with every little lateral movement. This is part of what leads people to take unnecessary damage and also leads to the perception that Muay Thai is a "stand-and-bang" sport.

The agility ladder is great for developing fast feet and the ability to move in very complicated ways quickly. In fact, it also helps build the mind-muscle connection with your feet. Unlocking this neuronal pathway is like getting a special achievement in a video game: it's the next level.

I have one of these, and it is one of my favorite pieces of training equipment. I like to it for warm-ups and burnouts at the end of my training. I find that these are a great way to get my feet moving and ready for training.

Aside from just warming me up, I also find that doing a few rounds of agility ladder work consistently over time does improve my footwork, letting me move faster and more efficiently. You can also use these anywhere, so if you don’t have room in your home for it, see if you can go to a park and lay it out there. Plus, you'll look like that cool, fit person who you always see working out and looking awesome in parks - they rock!

5 Agility Ladder Drills For Muay Thai

 #2: Reflex Ball

If your Instagram feed looks like mine (or Sean's), meaning it's mainly just fight content and memes, you’ve probably seen a few people playing around with these. Lomachenko is probably the first person most of us have seen use these for training, and from there, they exploded, and now I can’t stop seeing ads for them. 

These, while they do seem gimmicky, can actually be a very useful training tool and can be fun to just mess around with! I have one of these as well and I find that they are well suited to cooldowns rather than warm ups, as it is difficult to build up a sweat while working with a reflex ball but it can be a fun and even kind of relaxing, yet still challenging way to finish off a training session. I recommend doing 1 or two rounds of this either as a cooldown or just some random time when you’re home.

These are also really cheap to but and you can even make them yourself with some bungee cord, a tennis ball and a hat. 

>>> You need a boxing reflex ball. Nak Muay Nation's got you.

#3: Kettlebells

Once again, this is a piece of equipment is pretty gimmicky, and it’s not helped by all of the cringe stuff online that people say about them. Stuff like, "this is the only piece of equipment any will ever need!" (spoiler: it's not). Despite the misleading weirdos, kettlebells for Muay Thai is a legit combination.

Most of us don’t have access to gyms right now. If you’re like me, you miss lifting some heavy shit. While you might be tempted to buy an entire squat or dumbbell rack. you might not have the money or space for one. A solid alternative to this is to buy a single kettlebell. Yep: just one. 

You can do a lot of really functional exercises to improve different aspects of your game. Seriously, this is the only product on this list that I do not have, and I wish that I did. With a kettlebell, you can do all of your basic weight training exercises, but you can also do so many that you can’t with dumbbells or barbells. Kettlebell swings are great for developing hip power for kicks; Turkish getups are perfect, too, for becoming stronger in the clinch. 

Turkish Getup for Building Full-Body Strength and Power for Muay Thai