Author: Melina Yung

Week 1

SUNSHINE COAST Monday: I finally found a campervan..and it’s AWESOME! I felt really happy and comfortable the instant I sat in the drivers seat! I am super excited to get on the road now!   I dropped in to a few gyms whilst on the Sunshine Coast and did 2 nights of training & running.   Got as much work as… Read more →

Hittin’ the road

So 2 weeks ago I had my final fight, which I’ll post about soon in my Fight History Blog. The plan now for me is I’m hitting the road for the next 9 months with the aim of visiting every fight gym on the East Coast of Australia to chat them about how I’ve been helping trainers, fighters and promoters… Read more →

Sparks Elite Ambassador

I’m super stoked to announce a brand new partnership between Sparks Elite, FightSys Gym Management Systems and Nationally Registered Fighters (Australia)!! Sparks Elite have taken me onboard as an ambassador and in turn I have enlisted the services of Andrew Sparks to help me continue to grow both my businesses well into 2017. After a massive 2016, I’ve been looking to find the… Read more →

Fight #19: Super 4 Woman Eliminator

img_4515Finally something I wanted to tick off my bucket list. To fight in a 4 woman. I have wanted to experience having 2 fights in one night for a few years now, but alas, for me this wasn’t to happen.

 

At the weigh in the draw was done to see who would be fighting each other first up.

The draw consisted of Leonie Macks, who I had just fought the month before for the WMC Australian Title and after a tough war I lost the chance of nabbing the belt. Watch the fight here

 

Then there was multiple world champion (which includes a WBC World Title) Lucy Payne who has had around 35 fights, is 182cms tall with a huge reach advantage and the favourite to win the eliminator.

 

and also in the mix, Maxie Smith, who is a tough fighter who’s been living, breathing and training Muay Thai over in the motherland, Thailand for the majority of her fight career, beating some very tough opponents over there.

 

No matter who I drew it was going to be a hard night in the office!

 

I drew Lucy for the first fight. 

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Me = 165cms / Lucy = 182cm

On the night, we were first fight out of the Eliminator.

Round 1, I started out landing some good kicks and knees, but then copped a hard knee to the sternum which knocked the wind out of me.

 

After this my brain decided it would go into la la land and I just stopped thinking and started fighting on emotions, which was the worst thing I could have done against some one of Lucy’s calibre.

 

I couldn’t get in on her reach and was constantly getting kneed in the face and body. I spent the next part of round 1 and most of round 2 just copping knees and not really img_5114doing much about it, I ate a nice knee to the teeth (which I wouldn’t recommend anyone experiencing if they can help it!).

 

Finally towards the end of round 2, I snapped out of it and started to try and nullify her knees by blocking them.

 

Round 3 was slightly better for me, my trainer Richie Walsh told me in the break to just go out there and have fun, it was very obviously i’d lost the fight at this point. Unless I happened to get a lucky shot in and get a KO, there wasn’t much else I could do other than enjoy myself.  So I just went out there and threw anything I could, to try and get in on Lucy’s reach.  I was jumping and throwing big swings with no dings and actually started getting my brain switched back on.  I stopped being angry at myself which opened up my mind again.

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I did manage to land a few nice shots.  I was excited as I finally pulled off the teep/catch/pull & punch combo i’ve always done in sparring, but never actually done it in a fight. So that was a little happy dance for me.

 

Lucy used her reach perfectly and her experience completely out classed me. The focus in her eyes and the determination on her face was palpable. She’s a great fighter! I regret not being at my peak to fight her. I never mind losing if i’ve done my absolute best! I do however, get very disappointed in myself with a loss like this, an opportunity wasted to test myself (the best version of myself) against a World Class fighter.

 

Lucy has fought some of the worlds best (notably the amazing Tiffany Van Soest twice) and to have been able to come up against this type of experience should have been a highlight of my career. But it was not to be. I let my frustration take over, which stopped me from mentally navigating the fight. Lesson learned! (the hard way).

 

img_5176I walked away with a sore tooth and a banged up shin & ankle, but I also walked away with a massive massive lesson and a renewed thirst to learn more both physically and mentally!  Lucy went on to fight Leonie Macks in the final, Lucy coming away with the win.

 

After a rough few days post fight with being disappointed in myself,  I am so lucky to be surrounded by some very beautiful, caring and supportive people, these legends, helped me to get refocused and ready to get back to work.  After 1 weeks rest, it’s back to training to work hard on preparing for my next fight…a tag team! Stay tuned! This ones going to be entertainment to the MAX!!!


Check out photos of my fight here:

Opponent: Lucy Payne – Supafight Gym
Weight: 60kgs – weighed in at 59.95kgs
Show: Siam Pro | 4 Woman Eliminator | Brisbane
Date: October 22nd, 2016
Result: Loss – UPD

Fight #18: WMC Australian Title Fight

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Wow what an amazing feeling! I had the opportunity to fight one of Australia’s toughest fighters for the prestigious WMC AUSTRALIAN TITLE in Sydney. Leonie is a strong and experienced fighter and it was an honour to step into the ring with her.

This was my first fight back in almost 12 months and it felt awesome to be in there again! I loved every minute of this fight! Check it out here…


Watch my fight here:

Opponent: Leonie Macks (Sitshoothon)
Weight: 61kgs – weighed in at 60.4kgs
Show: Siam 2 Sydney | WMC Australian Title Fight
Date: September, 2016
Result: Loss – UPD

ROUND 1 – Scroll down to see the other rounds

Round 2

Round 3

Round 4

Round 5

Decision

Fight #5: Fighting by remote control

FBCOVERFight

This fight is by far one of my favourite fights to date.  Not just because of the outcome, but also because of how it made me feel afterwards. WATCH FIGHT HERE

 

Prelude:
After my previous fight, I took a few months off from fighting as I had quit my full time IT job after being with my employer for a total of 9 years (in between travelling NRF Australiathe world), I had also started focusing on building my own business called Nationally Registered Fighters (Australia) which I was really excited to get off the ground, at the same time I was also studying part time in a Business Management Course so I really needed to find a job that would allow me to do all of this, plus force me to train.  I was offered some Part Time work to help out my friends at Urban Fight Gym.   I was finding it hard to motivate myself to turn up for training at 350 Fitness, as I kept filling in all my time with working and studying.  So to force myself to get back to fight training, I made the very tough decision to move from 350 Fitness Boxing & Muay Thai Gym over to Urban Fight Gym.

 

It was quite an emotional time as my trainer is such a good friend of mine, but what made it that little bit easier was the fact I was going to both our good mates gym.  Urban Fight Gym is a “sister” gym to 350, this being because the owner and head trainer of Urban Richard Walsh was Claytons trainer when he was a fighter growing up.  They are not just friends but more like brothers to one another, so the fact that I was staying “in the family” was a bit easier to transition across.  I also now had NO excuse for missing training because I was now there for work so couldn’t make up any reasons for why I was “too busy working” to make it to training!

 

I had already trained at Urban in the past,  when my gym old closed down and while Clayton was in the process of opening 350 Fitness, not to mention I had known Richie & Melissa Walsh for almost 10 years by that stage, and the fact that I now worked there, it meant that I was instantly comfortable training there full time.

 

World Champions Nathan "Carnage Corbett" & Caley Reece (on right) at the NRF Stall with me & my bestie
World Champions Nathan “Carnage Corbett” & Caley Reece (on right) at the NRF Stall with me & my bestie

This brings us to April 2013, I got started in to my new fight training regime with Richie.  By September a fight had come up on a bigger show, No Surrender.   It was a bit daunting knowing the size of the crowds that No Surrender get, so I was excited to be on a show like this.  I had also agreed to have my Business (NRF) have a stall at the show, which in hindsight was silly to commit to working at the same show I was fighting on!

 

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World Champions Nathan “Carnage Corbett” & Caley Reece signing at the NRF Stall

I got to the show early to set up my stall, I’d also organised to have Caley Reece & Nathan “Carnage” Corbett signing posters for their fans at the NRF stall as well so I made sure I had everything organised for them.  Once I’d set everything up, Caley and Nathan were awesome enough to keep an eye on my stall while  I went out the back to start to prepare for my fight.

 

Going into this fight I felts so confident and comfortable.  After the fight I honestly didn’t even feel like it was me in there fighting, it literally felt like I was being remote controlled by Richie.  He has such an amazing eye in the corner and just as I was about to step in to the ring, Melissa Walsh (who is a former champion and Richies Wife) said to me “Just listen to Richie, whatever he tells you to throw, do it as soon as he says it”.   So that was the last thing I heard before I got in there and boy did it work a treat.  I didn’t have to worry about anything else in this fight, other than listening, this made it so much easier to concentrate on my breathing and moving around because Richie literally did all the rest with his instructions!

 

After this fight I was so blown away with the support I received and the best part of it all was I was offered Sponsorship by PUNISH FIGHT GEAR.  I couldn’t believe it!FB_IMG_1428610357282  The only other Female Fighter they sponsor is Caley Reece and they have been long time sponsors of 11 x World Champion Nathan “Carnage Corbett”, as you can imagine I was absolutely over the moon to have the support of such an awesome company who had the belief in me that I could go far in this sport.

 

Also listening back to the commentary in this fight (see video below) really opened my eyes to the potential I had, I hadn’t really heard anyone say anything about my fighting so everything that happened in this fight just m1266923_10201361485072997_328491112_oade me want to try and push myself further in Muay Thai! So thank you commentators Richard Jensen & Brad Hull on your kind words (and funny comments!)

 

This fight is definitely one that I will always cherish.  Massive thank you to everyone who was involved, before, during and after.  You guys helped me in ways you can’t even imagine!

 


Watch my fight here:

Opponent: Laura Kanerva (Nukzu Gym)
Weight: 60kgs – weighed in at 59.5kgs
Show: No Surrender 5 | Brisbane
Date: September, 2013
Result: Win – UPD


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Fight #4: Air Ninja Skills

Take that Air!
Take that Air!

My fourth fight was at the end of 2012, in Brisbane, I was training and fighting out of 350 Fitness – Boxing & Muay Thai Gym with Clayton Collyer.

As this was only my 4th time in the ring, I was still very new to everything, what I learnt from this fight was I really needed to work on getting my range right. I spent the majority of this fight beating up the air around me, instead of my opponent…and boy did i get that air good!

My opponent & I at weigh in

I weighed in at 62.2 with my opponent weighing in at 63.1.  I was so excited to have actually weighed in way under this time.  It was all with the help of my good friend Melissa Walsh, who is a qualified Nutritionist and Naturopath.  Melissa helped me with a great weight cutting nutrition plan, which was easy to follow and got me awesome results!

After 2 losses in a row it felt great to get my 2nd win!  So much for having thought I was only going to have 1 fight, then I changed my mind and thought i’d have 3 fights, but after coming away with losses for my 2nd and 3rd fights it made me want to learn more and try again for the win.  So reaching my new goal was great.  However, it also only made me hungrier for more fights! 

 

Watch my fight here:

Opponent: Tamara Quaife (First Strike Gym)
Weight: 63kgs
Show: Heat in the Hills | Arana PCYC, Brisbane
Date: December, 2012
Result: Win

 

PHOTOS

 

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Fight #3 – Fighting Drunk (ish)

Sept 2012: For this fight our game plan was to kick more and move. In my previous fights I probably punched a lot more, but we knew my opponent was big on the hands, so we thought to counter that, I should not try to stand and trade, but instead use my legs more and move. But being that this was only my third time in the ring, it hadn’t yet occurred to me, that when your trainers says to do more of something, it doesn’t mean don’t do other things as well haha…so I spent a lot of this fight trying to stop myself from wanting to punch instead of letting my hands go and then following with kicks…. lesson learnt as this turned out to be my first (and so far only) 8 count i’ve had put on me.

Bridie hit me flush hard in the face with a right in the 3rd round. It was a clean and hard punch by Bridie. This was the first time i’ve experienced a concussion in a fight. I couldn’t work out why the ref (Brad Vocale) was standing in front of me….he was putting a count on me and I was thinking, why are you over here? what happened?

smallerI couldn’t work it out. I got back to my feet and continued the fight. I couldn’t hear anything and I was seeing stars – like lots of little white light spots and everything was blurry. I continued to fight the rest of the round as if I was extremely drunk. I kept moving, but my legs kept giving way on me each time I moved. I couldn’t seem to get my feet back under me.

It’s strange what goes through your head at times like this…all I was thinking was “oh wow, this is what it feels like” I wasn’t focused on anything except being amazed and interested in what this was feeling like!

As soon as the bell rang at the end the fight, the first thing that immediately came out of my mouth, I said to Bridie…”what was that? What did you get me with?” I had no idea what had happened still. It’s a really weird feeling.


Watch my fight here:

Opponent: Bridie Jane (Hitman Gym)
Weight: 63kgs
Show: Prophecy – Future Muay Thai | Gold Coast
Date:Sept 15 2012
Result: Loss

Apologies the sound doesn’t work on this video, so it’s kind of like a mime fight? Maybe make your own background noises while I get punched in the face and show my terrible fighting skills! haha

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