Canadian Muay Thai Open 2025

I first heard about the Canadian Muay Thai Open (CMTO) at the Muay Thai Ontario (MTO) Championships in 2024. I wasn’t fighting at the MTO Championships. I attended as a volunteer, pretending to be a very important blogger (read previous blog)! During the Gym Owners’ meeting (yes, I attended that too), there was a lot of talk about CMTO and how it was the biggest Canadian Muay Thai tournament, so athletes didn’t have to travel all the way to Iowa for TBA.

I happened to be sitting beside Kru Daryl at that meeting, and he told me on the spot that I could attend CMTO as a blogger. But as we kept talking, he mentioned that there were athletes in my weight division in previous years, which really got me thinking about stepping into the ring.

I need to back up a little and talk about my Muay Thai journey, partly because nobody blogged about me and my fight, and mostly because Kru Daryl went to Mexico to escape a post-CMTO interview with me! Kind of excessive, if you ask me. He could’ve just said no! Rolling my eyes. But since I don't have much to share about the CMTO background and the challenges of running a tournament, this will be all about me:

A very dear Yogi friend of mine referred me to Kru Arash to learn self-defense in February of 2024… but Kru tricked me into learning Muay Thai. Shortly after I started, I remember googling whether throwing kicks releases dopamine in the body because I found them addictive! A few months into training, Kru Arash said I could get in the ring in a year or two. It actually made me very upset. After all, my first goal was to learn how to escape attacks and avoid being in a fight. So I asked Kru to stop talking about me becoming a fighter. It was actually a very serious conversation.

A few months later, when he was still bringing up the idea of me fighting, I told him, “If I ever ask to get in the ring, please be a good Kru and stop me.” Listening is really not Kru Arash’s strong suit… oh well.

I signed up for this tournament as soon as registration opened in March of 2025! I actually waited for it to open, and once I signed up, I started training. So it ended up being about five months of fight camp for me, which was necessary, since I was transitioning from a yogi to a Nak Muay!

Fast forward to CMTO, August 15–17, 2025:

The weekend was all highs and no lows. I think there was about an hour of panic when the officials’ scales were reading 0.3 kg heavier than the test scales. But I have a feeling Kru Laura did that intentionally just to keep everyone on their toes. I also found out that some people really look horrible first thing in the morning with pillow marks all over their faces.

Originally, I was going to have four matches, but we lost a couple to injuries and weight brackets, so the three of us remained. I was really hoping to be the one getting two fights, but Kru Daryl made it clear he’s not accepting blog mentions as bribes so I got only one. I also asked Kru Daryl for a media pass so I could be on deck and connect with a few fighters during my downtime (which was a whole day), but he denied it. He said that if he allowed me, then he’d have to allow everyone else. I thought Kru Daryl and I had an agreement that I was very special. I’m going to hold this against him until next year.

I must say, for those who’ve never competed at a tournament, the scene is very intimidating and impersonal. I’ve attended a lot of fight nights over the past year, and yes, fighters still have jitters walking to the ring but they walk with their team, to their ring song, and spend some time sealing the ring and maybe doing their Wai Kru dance. But at a tournament, when there are 300 athletes competing, you feel like just a number. Your friends and teammates watch from far away, behind glass, so you can’t even hear them. Well, Coach Hamed yells so loud that, when I was in the ring, I couldn’t hear Kru Arash in my corner, but I could hear Coach Hamed yelling “TEEEEEP!”

And yes, about the ring:

The ring is a beast. I don’t know if the tournament atmosphere added to it, but the second I stepped into the ring, my legs felt like stones, and all the strength drained out of my body. Mentally, I was zoned out. I couldn’t hear a thing (except Coach Hamed, apparently)! When I was in the corner between rounds, I saw Kru Arash and Coach Alireza just staring at me. I kept thinking to myself: Shouldn’t they be talking?? They talk and talk all the time and now that they should be talking, they don’t??

As you probably know, I lost my first fight which was at CMTO. But here’s the thing: the female athlete I lost to won Best Female Athlete of the Year! So by default, that makes me the second-best female athlete of the year, right?

But honestly, when I stepped down from the ring, Kru Yai Harold had the biggest smile on his face, gave me a big hug, and said, “You did so well! I’m soooo proud of you.” And that was enough for me.

And the best, best part about CMTO was seeing some of you who read my blogs. That was the best part. Don’t stop!

It’s my aim to register as a B-Class fighter at CMTO next year so see you all around.