ONE Championship: Hong Kong’s Emily Chong has impressive debut win against Japanese rival
The 18-year-old university student, who defeated Japan’s Ohara in Bangkok, says the pandemic helped kickstart, hone her Muay Thai career
The name Emily Chong would not have been familiar to many people before her impressive win at ONE Friday Fights 80 last week. The teenager from Hong Kong beat Koko Ohara by decision at Lumpinee Stadium and says the win in her first fight was the culmination of a journey that began six years ago.
Chong, who is a student at the University of Hong Kong, told the Post after the fight that she was now a professional Muay Thai fighter competing at the top level but that training started out as a casual family affair.
“I started martial arts when I was 12 years old, with my mum and my sister,” said Chong, 18.
“We would go every Sunday, for fun, to a fitness class and then I would see a fighter and think ‘that’s so cool I want to be a fighter too’.”
The Covid-19 pandemic brought the sports industry to an abrupt halt. Many fighters were forced into early retirement as they were unable to compete and their training facilities were closed due to social distancing rules.
For Chong, it had the opposite effect. With plenty of time on her hands she decided to replicate the training schedule of the best fighters in the sport at home.
