Shannon “One Shin” Wiratchai just wants to have fun. This Saturday Night, he will have the opportunity to have some fun, elevate his career, and soak up the roars of his fellow countrymen, too.
The Thai mixed martial arts pioneer will meet the Richard “Notorious” Corminal in a lightweight showdown at ONE: WARRIOR KINGDOM on 11 March, live from the Impact Arena in Bangkok.
Currently riding a four-fight win streak, the 28-year-old Wiratchai looks to build upon his sizzling 6-1 record against Corminal, a Malaysia-based Filipino who has a formidable boxing and Muay Thai background.
“He is a good striker with power,” the Thai admits. “It is going to be fun because I never start my fights with grappling. I start with striking and see how it goes. I do not want to sound cocky, but I think I am better and I will do everything to win the fight.”
Wiratchai knows a little bit of everything, at least when it pertains to the martial arts. He has been training ever since he was a child.
As his parents, a doctor and a nurse, viewed Muay Thai as an intimidating and fierce discipline, they permitted young Shannon to train in judo, and he went on to earn his black belt. From judo, his passion for the martial arts grew to kung fu, and eventually it led to MMA.
First, he needed to get his mother and father’s blessing, which would be easier said than done. Both were medical professionals, and his dad even previously stitched him up after one of his competitions. Sensitive to their concerns, he spent time teaching them about the sport.
“I think it took me more than five years to educate them, and show them that it can look scary and there can be injuries, but if you fight in the right way with the right organization which has safety in mind, that MMA is the safest combat sport,” he explains.
In September 2011, “OneShin” made his professional MMA debut for a local Thai promotion and scored a unanimous decision. He followed that up nearly eight months later with a second-round rear-naked choke victory.
Soon thereafter, he signed with ONE Championship. The Thai had a rocky start in Asia’s biggest MMA organization, having his promotional debut victory against Mitch Chilson overturned to a no contest, and several months later, experiencing his first and only defeat at the hands of Pakistani MMA pioneer Bashir Ahmad.
Wiratchai turned his misfortunes around in October 2013, by knocking out Chilson in a rematch at ONE: TOTAL DOMINATION, and winning his next three bouts. Now, the Bangkok Fight Lab product will seek to extend that four-fight win streak when he meets Corminal, a 4-1 promotional newcomer, in Bangkok.
While this is a chance for him to take a step forward into the division’s elite, he also has an opportunity to further educate his countrymen on this growing sensation known as mixed martial arts, very much in the same way he educated his medical professional parents.
“If I was fighting in a small organization that was not famous, people would not see it as a proper sport. They would think it was underground or pit fighting. But fighting in a world class organization is going to be much better,” he states.
“It is an opportunity for Thai people to see that MMA is a proper sport, a proper way of fighting. We are not just animals brought into the cage to kill each other. It is not like that. We use the cage to stop the fighters from falling out, and we have small gloves because we want to be able to use a larger variety of techniques. When I fight for ONE, Thai people will be educated more, and in a proper way.”
