“If you think you're beaten, you are. If you think you dare not, you don't. If you’d like to win, but think you can’t, you won’t.”
That’s the unflinching motto ‘sensei’ Karl Kilbride instills in every fighter who walks through the doors of Team Kilbride Muay Thai Boxing Gym in Birkenhead. Karl, 55, from Wallasey, started kickboxing in 1986, when he was just 18, and fought 55 times during his 14-year career.
“I saw kickboxing on telly and I knew straight away that’s what I wanted to do,” Karl told the ECHO. “My trainer Alby Bimpson was like a father figure to me. He took me under his wing and was a real legend. Over the years I won the North West, English, British and Intercontinental Kick Boxing titles and managed to beat the Brazilian, French and South African champions.”
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After retiring from competitive kickboxing 20 years ago, Karl began coaching friends for fun, and the seeds of Team Kilbride were sown.
“We knocked out the ceiling in my mate’s house so we could throw ropes over the joists to hang the punch bags on,” he said.
“We trained there for six months but then more people were asking to join so I moved to the back room of the Kings Arms in pub Seacombe.”
As Karl’s client base started to grow, he set up shop at The House of Pain gym in Birkenhead and, by 2011, had coached eight Thai boxers to world champion status.
Away from the ring, Karl had to contend with adversity in his private life when his little boy’s medical condition. Son Thai was born with a club foot, a condition where the foot turns in and under, and had to undergo surgery at just two months old to enable him to walk.
Karl said: “He had to have an operation that involved cutting his achilles tendon open which left him in plaster for weeks. We used to have to stuff his feet into these boots and bars so his foot didn’t move. He’d be screaming in pain as the doctors tried to set his foot.”
“He had to have another operation when he was three and he couldn’t walk normally because his leg was arched from being in plaster. He was told that it would be 50/50 whether he’d be able to walk properly, never mind play sports.”
Although Thai has faced enormous physical challenges and may need a further operation to manage his condition in future, the eight-year-old was one of just three fighters selected to represent Team Kilbride at the K1 world championships in Germany in June.
German safety regulations meant that Thai faced the prospect of fighting without a chest guard and taking shots to the head, something not permitted in the English sport. Despite the new rules, Thai triumphed over a series of international competitors to become a world K1 champion.
Karl said: “Thai still wanted to fight even though this was a new way of fighting for him. It was a brand new experience altogether and I didn’t think he would want to compete. At one point in the fight he became overwhelmed which brought him to tears, he dug deep, biting down on his gum shield and plucked up the courage to win.”
And Thai wasn’t the only Kilbride to pick up silverware. Karl’s eldest son Jerome, 26, who helps to run classes at the Birkenhead gym, also secured a world championship title after defeating his Dutch opponent in the final.
“Jerome used to have epileptic fits, the first of which happened when he was 15,” Karl told the ECHO.
“He was training with us but he couldn’t do competitions because he couldn’t get hit in the head. Around his 21st birthday, he got the all clear and the first thing he said to the doctors was ‘can I get punched in the head now?’ A few months later he won the British title in the first fight.
“In Germany, he was winning his first fight comfortably until, out of the blue, he took a heavy head kick which sent him to the canvas. I didn’t think he was going to get up from it, but he made the count and got through to the final which he won. To me it was unbelievable”
Jake Franklin, 23, completed a clean sweep for Team Kilbride, claiming the title of WTKA 75kg World Champion after executing a first round knockout.
“I was crying my eyes out,” Karl said. “It was father’s day when the lads won and I was just so proud. I still get a bit of a lump in my throat talking about it because I can’t believe what we’ve achieved.”
That sense of achievement is all the more potent for Karl when he reflects on his humble beginnings, and he attributes much of his success to girlfriend Jacqui who he says has been his “backbone” through his journey. The 55-year-old continues to strive to influence the lives of young people across Merseyside through the work of Team Kilbride.
He said: “My main goal is to change kids' lives. Some of the kids come in and they’re scared of their own shadow but you see their confidence grow. The sport is great for your mental health.
“I can’t believe how far we’ve come. I started in the back of a pub. From my fighting days, I knew that what I teach works. It just shows that, with three different fighters of different ages winning, we must be doing something right.”
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