Your first ninety days, and what not to rush

Stance and movement before anything else — being balanced while moving is the foundation every technique sits on. Then the jab and cross, then the lead round kick and the teep. That is a very short list and it is deliberately short: four techniques thrown correctly beat twenty thrown badly, and the fighters you admire have spent decades on approximately these four.

Three sessions a week for three months builds more skill than six sessions a week for six weeks followed by an injury or burnout. Motor learning consolidates between sessions, not during them. Consistency is the whole game at this stage, and the most common failure mode is going too hard in month one and stopping in month two.

Light technical sparring can begin once you can hold a stance and defend simple attacks — often around the two-month mark. Hard sparring should not. There is no training benefit to being hit hard as a beginner that outweighs the cost, and a gym that puts new students into competitive sparring in their first month is telling you something about how it treats people. Ask before you join.

Hand wraps and gloves to start. Shin guards once you begin partner kick drills, a mouthguard before any contact at all, and a groin guard for sparring. That is the whole list for ninety days. Do not buy specialised gear for a code you have not yet chosen — savate shoes and Muay Thai shorts are decisions for later.