The Challenger Muaythai blog - Mostafa Abdollahi

by Mostafa Abdollahi

I was the Iranian Muaythai team captain for several years and earned a few medals in different international Muaythai competitions. I was one of the last fighters to be chosen to enter the Challenger Muaythai from the WMC and I only found out for definite 2 days before I had to fly to KL! The WMC (World Muaythai Council) chose me because I'm a Muslim fighter from the middle east and they were interested in my background and fight style.

When I got to the villa I recognized some famous and experienced fighters and also I knew some of the fighters already. I thought it's gonna be a tough challenge for me, but this didn't freak me out because I'm always looking for challenges and new experiences. I can say the Challenger Muaythai has been fantastic and a great opportunity for me to live & train with champions.

THE FIGHT
I got picked as best clincher of the last 6 fighters remaining in round 1. The fighters and trainers both picked me. I was planning all along to pick Frank, I'd been studying his fight style all week at training and I really wanted to fight him. Another reason was because I was supposed to fight him on the Gold Coast, Australia last year, but my visa didn't come through in time on that occasion. I saw this as a good opportunity to fight him on the Challenger. When it was the time to pick someone to fight, at the last minute I changed my mind and I thought it be better I take an easy fight first and don't get any bad injuries. I picked Jason Woodham because he's so much lighter than me so I assumed it would be easy, but honestly I was wrong to think that and it was not an easy fight for me mentally or physically. 

When I went to the ring and started my wai khru it hit me where I was and who I was due to fight, I wasn't in the right frame of mind at all, don't know why, maybe because I was fighting my mate. Anyway first round Jay did his best performance so far and won that round. I was lucky to have Ajarn Nugget in my corner, he saw that I wasn't thinking right in round 1 and made me relax and get back to myself and my fight style. Round two was much better for me than the first round, not rushing, better technique and I did the fight I wanted. I used my punches a bit more on target and tried to control the fight. I gave Jay 1 big punch and after referee counted I saw his eyes weren't fully normal yet so I went forward again and caught him with a 1-2 combo, he went down and I went to the white corner. He was asleep on the floor, it wasn't good to see Jay like that. I was not happy in that kind of victory, even though I knew I won and went to quarterfinal.

AFTERMATH
Ajarn Nugget told me, "Mosi you need to improve yourself for the next match because its not gonna be like your first fight." I was happy I won, but felt that I didn't show my usual technique and could have fought a lot better. People who have seen me fight before would know what I mean, I usually do better than that and so I thought the other Challengers would look at me and if they didn't know my usual fight style would now think I was a bit of an easy target after that performance. I went to Jay's locker room to make sure he was alright. He was fine but had a headache and told me "OK Mosi you win this match no problem, but now you must win the Challenger and give me some money too." Cheeky ;) it was funny. When I went back to the villa I saw all the other fighters there and said to myself right Mosi, it was just the first step and still a long way to go, so you need to improve and show your fight style in the next match.

I would like to say thank you to all my fans especially the Iranian people in Malaysia who came to the stadium and cheered me on, also thank you to all my sponsors FBT, Fight Life, Bio-Nutrics, Rhino Mouthguards.