Apidej Sit-Hirun
March 30, 2007 by nopstar
For those of you who consider yourselves Nak Muay, Apidej Sit-Hirun is a name I think you should know. Don’t you think its funny the further you get away from Thailand them more people are comfortable calling themselves “Master” (Ajarn). There are a few senior Monks at a Thai Forrest Monestary here in Northern California that I address as Ajarn. Personally I think it’s a nice Marketing ploy, it fits in with the traditional martial arts world to refer to oneself as master.
Anyway I’m getting way off topic. My point is that you should familiarize with Apidej Sit-Hirun, regarded as one of if not these best fighters of the modern era. Although I have not personally met Khun Apidej, I know from my trainers and others he doesn’t call himself Ajarn or Master.
During the 1960’s Khun Apidej simultaneously held seven titles in Muay Thai and International Boxing. It’s an achievement that is still yet to be matched. King Bhumibol in recognition of Khun Apidej achievements named him “Fighter of the Century”. Khun Apidej is also the only Boxer to have a display at the National Museum.
At the age of 39 and with 350-400 fights under his belt Khun Apidej retired to spend time with his wife. He was called out of retirement on few occasions to fight much younger fighters, but his age was a significant factor and was unsuccessful.
Today you can find Khun Apidej training fighters at the Fairtex Camp in Bangplee.
Here is a HL clip posted by KhanomRay. Check out those gloves! It looks like they are wearing mittens.
Great someone put this tribute to him together so us “newbies” can learn more about the older Thai fighters. I also liked the article written about Bunkerd in The New Yorker. I purchased an electronic copy if you’d like to post it here Mai.
Nice video. I have not seen that before. I met Apidej really quickly a few years ago and he was very, very nice.
Apidej is incredible. Still training people at Bangplee and enthusiastic about it.
I’ll send you the article on Bunkerd too.
I had the honor of actually training with him when I was visiting Fairtex Bangplee a few years ago. He was very intimidating at first because of his size – he is tall for a Thai, my guess would be that he was about 5′10 at least. But the moment you make contact with him, you will automatically warm up to his cheerful persona and passion for laughing and joking around. The first morning I was there, I was running loops around the grounds around 630am when I noticed him taking care to feed his birds before the early morning sessions. I smiled at him and then stopped to wai him. He asked who I was scheduled to train with me and said he was open if I wanted to go a few rounds with him. I politey accepted and he smiled and told me to meet him ringside! But as soon as the round started, he was very serious. He was hell bent on getting me to kick correctly, every time emphasizing where it is on the opponent’s body that I should attack, he taught me a few points that I think are no longer allowed today, but hurt like hell: elbowing the quad muscule when someone kicks and digging the heel of your foot in your opponent’s calf during a brief clinch. He also emphasied how “beautiful” it is to be able to to a teep straight to the underside of your opponent’s jaw. “Beautiful” was his catch-phrase…and my goal was to hear him tell that as much as possible. But me being a mere 5′2″, he help the Thai Pads so friggin’ high I had to aim to kick as high as my own shoulder! He gave me the workout of my life, and when each round was over, I waied him out of gratitude and respect…he even did me the honor of posing for a photo with me afterwards!
If you look closely, I am grinning through the pain & exhaustion!
Woah! He sure sounds like an exceptional fighter and individual!
Huge kudos to a man who still feels the same love and commitment to the sport despite his old age!
I don’t have much to add here but I wanted to say I really enjoy this blog and this entry was particularly good.
I saw Khun Apidej on the “Deadly Arts” series which airs on Fit TV in the US, and he seemed like a really personable and funny guy — but they didn’t show much footage of his fights. That vid is fantastic. Thanks!
Very nice person indeed and very knowledgeable about being in the ring. I trained mainly with him during my stay at Fairtex. I gave him a bottle of Johnny before I left.
[...] can across another old school clip of Apidej again the other day. The one thing that caught my eye was their movement. The clip is from 1967 but [...]
he isn’t teaching at fairtex anymore, does anyone know what’s up? moved to another gym or is he retired?
i’m trying to get to train with him
“he isn’t teaching at fairtex anymore, does anyone know what’s up? moved to another gym or is he retired?
i’m trying to get to train with him”
I see that your post is about 6 months old, but yeah he totally is training at Fairtex, I was just there and trained with him about 4 or 5 times