Does anyone know of any good Muay Thai Kickboxing classes in Chicago? I am not looking for a McDojo, but a serious class. I have searched the internet, but I have not found anything being advertised. Thanks in advance.
OK bro here it is best i see it: I came to Chicago 3 years ago from Holland, and originally UK. I had been training at Peter Aerts' school in Holland (Meijero) and also in Chiang Mai (n.Thailand). I really wanted to step up my training and compete, having been too busy with school before. The ONLY place i could find in Chicago, within easy access by CTA, (there are some schools in the suburbs, probably within an hour dirve, but i have no car), was CFC, mainly a Shodokan school, but they had a great MT coach. He only trained once a week on wednesday, not too many students, but had fought and won in Bangkok & was was really good. Then he got a brain hemmorhage and stopped teaching, permamently. Dagerberg's has some MT but (no disrespect) i went there and it didnt seem any good. I started training with Stephan Bonnar's Boxing coach downtown chicago and 2 golden gloves later, my love for boxing is still strong. Do i miss MT? Sure, i have pads and get people to hold them once in a while, as for classes, Stephan drives 2 1/2 hours to train with a good Muay Thai coach (forgot his name, buts hes fought in K-1, etc), so obviously he cannot find anything round here either. Good luck man, please let me know if you find anything...
Where exactly are you located? If your in the North Suburbs you can check out http://www.ohanama.com It's in grayslake, IL. MT instructor is Brian, he's a serious instructor.
Thanks for the info. I was thinking I was just not looking at the right places, but it looks as if there really are a lack of Muay Thai classes in the Downtown area. I currently live in East Village, so I am looking for something within the city, close to downtown. That place Dagerberg's (sp?) looks like a McDojo to me...
Hmmm, not sure if you have the transportation to make it there, or if the place is still around as I no longer live in Chicago, but the Aiki Training Hall in Skokie used to be pretty solid. I know they usually went to Thailand once a year to compete.
I go to degerbergs, the one on western n lawrence. As an overall place yes it is a mcdojo but individually its great. I been going there for less than 2 years and it's either they're extremely good or crap. The higher ranked instructors are all very talented in their respectable styles but from purple belt down the majority of them are all the same. Degerbergs would be best if you just signed up for personal lessons with the instructors rather than taking the normal classes. Their thai,kali and jeet kun do instructors are excellent.
