Every fighting art is defined by its practitioners. You can study the rules, memorize the techniques, and understand the history, but the soul of a martial art lives in the people who step into the ring and put everything on the line. Lethwei is no different. The fighters profiled in this chapter are more than athletes — they are cultural ambassadors, national heroes, and living proof that the Art of Nine Limbs belongs on the global stage.
Some of these warriors rose from the dusty festival circuits of rural Myanmar, fighting bareknuckle under the equatorial sun before crowds of thousands. Others crossed oceans, drawn by a sport that promised something no other combat discipline could offer: pure, unfiltered combat without the safety net of gloves. Together, they have built the modern mythology of Lethwei, and their stories illuminate why this ancient art refuses to die.
What unites these fighters across generations and borders is not a shared technique or a common nationality but a shared philosophy: the belief that combat, at its highest expression, should be honest. In Lethwei, there is nowhere to hide. The absence of gloves means every punch carries its full consequence for both the striker and the receiver. The legality of headbutts means the clinch is not a resting position but the most dangerous phase of the fight. The knockout-only victory condition means that points, politics, and hometown judging cannot steal a deserved outcome. The fighters in this chapter chose this unforgiving arena willingly, and their stories reveal what the sport demands of those who enter it.
DAVE LEDUC
"The King of Lethwei"
Born: December 13, 1991 · Canada · Six-Time World Champion
Dave Leduc's path to Lethwei began not in a traditional gym but on the street. Born in Gatineau, Quebec, Leduc left home at seventeen after a falling-out with his father and channeled his energy into martial arts, joining Sifu Patrick Marcil's academy in Gatineau, where he trained Sanda and Jeet Kune Do principles and drilled bareknuckle bag work. In July 2014 he traveled to Thailand to compete in Prison Fight, an event sanctioned by the Thai Department of Corrections in which inmates at Klongpai maximum-security prison fought visiting challengers for a chance at reduced sentences; Leduc won his bout by unanimous decision.
Lethwei was illegal to train in Quebec, so Leduc built his early career in Thailand before making his Lethwei debut in Myanmar on August 21, 2016, where he dominated undefeated 75 kg champion Too Too over five rounds in a fight that still ended in a draw under the sport's knockout-only rules. That performance earned him a shot at Tun Tun Min, Myanmar's Openweight Golden Belt champion. Their first meeting, on October 9, 2016 at Thein Pyu Stadium in Yangon, was closely contested: Tun Tun Min dominated the early rounds before Leduc rallied, and the fight was declared a draw.
The rematch came on December 11, 2016, with the Golden Belt on the line. Leduc targeted Tun Tun Min's lead leg with push kicks throughout, and in round three caught a high kick and threw him off balance, twisting Tun Tun Min's knee. Tun Tun Min was forced to take the injury time-out; after another throw he could not continue and forfeited in round three. Leduc became the first non-Burmese fighter to hold the Openweight Lethwei Golden Belt.
Leduc defended the belt repeatedly over the next two years — including draws against Adem Yilmaz and Cyrus Washington and a knockout win over Diesellek TopkingBoxing — before the rubber match with Tun Tun Min, billed as “The Biggest Fight in Lethwei History,” on December 16, 2018 at a sold-out Thein Pyu Stadium. Leduc floored Tun Tun Min with a headbutt early in round one, then knocked him down again with an elbow; Tun Tun Min used his two-minute injury time-out both times and fought on. After five rounds with no further knockout, the bout was declared a draw under traditional rules and Leduc retained the belt. The fight drew a cumulative audience of 37 million — the highest viewership in Lethwei history.
Beyond the ring, Leduc married Moldovan model Irina Terehova in a traditional Burmese wedding ceremony broadcast nationally in Myanmar and watched by an estimated 30 million viewers, becoming a celebrity in the country. He went on to become a six-time Lethwei world champion, largely under the World Lethwei Championship banner once it launched.
Leduc is now widely regarded as Lethwei's most visible international ambassador, having introduced the Art of Nine Limbs to global audiences through his fights, interviews and seminars.
TUN TUN MIN
"The Golden Boy"
Myanmar · Youngest-Ever Golden Belt Openweight Champion · 18 Title Defenses
If Dave Leduc is the face of international Lethwei, Tun Tun Min is the heartbeat of the sport in its homeland. Born October 4, 1992 in Kyaikmaraw, Mon State, he started training with sandbags his father bought at age six and fought his first bout, on sand, at nine. He left school in sixth grade to fight and support his family. On September 21, 2014, he beat Saw Nga Man to win the Openweight Lethwei Golden Belt at twenty-one — the youngest fighter ever to hold the title, a record that still stands.
Tun Tun Min built his reputation on an aggressive, forward-pressure style, wearing opponents down over five rounds rather than looking for a single finishing blow. According to Wikipedia's tally, he defended the Golden Belt eighteen times before losing it to Dave Leduc in 2016.
The three fights with Dave Leduc defined the rivalry that put Lethwei on the international map. The first, on October 9, 2016, ended in a draw. The second, on December 11, 2016, cost him the Golden Belt: Leduc caught a high kick and twisted Tun Tun Min's knee, forcing an injury time-out, and Tun Tun Min could not continue. The third, on December 16, 2018 and billed as the biggest fight in Lethwei history, saw Leduc knock him down with a headbutt and then an elbow in round one; Tun Tun Min used his injury time-out both times and fought on to a draw after five rounds, with Leduc retaining the belt.
Tun Tun Min, who is Mon and Muslim, has said he faced discrimination over his religion and once considered leaving the sport after a champions' calendar commissioned by the Myanmar Traditional Boxing Federation omitted his name and title. He returned from a knee injury to fight on, later signing with the World Lethwei Championship and continuing to compete into his thirties, including a 2023 SEA Games silver medal in Kun Khmer for Myanmar.
His rivalry with Leduc is widely credited with drawing the international attention that helped the World Lethwei Championship establish itself as Lethwei's major global promotion.
TOO TOO
Myanmar · Golden Belt Champion · Former WLC Middleweight World Champion
Born Maung Too on October 6, 1990 in Bu Kyun village, Yenanchaung, Magway Region, Too Too competed out of the Nagar Mahn gym in South Dagon Township, Yangon, under trainer Kyaw Soe. He held the 75 kg Lethwei Golden Belt until his reported death and was undefeated under traditional, knockout-only Lethwei rules across a career Wikipedia's fight-record table lists as 66 bouts: 39 wins (34 by knockout), 1 loss and 26 draws.
Too Too's only loss came under the World Lethwei Championship's judged rules, not the traditional knockout-only format. He signed with the WLC in 2017 and won the inaugural WLC Middleweight World Championship on November 4, 2017, defending it once before losing the title by decision to Naimjon Tuhtaboyev on January 31, 2020.
Too Too also fought internationally, drawing with Slovakia's Igor Danis at Kunlun Fight 25 in Banská Bystrica in 2015 — billed as the European premiere of Lethwei — and going seven rounds to a draw with American fighter Cyrus Washington at Thein Pyu Stadium the same year, a fight both men said afterward they did not want to repeat.
Too Too was arrested at his home in Minbu Township on 11 April 2022 for taking part in protests against the 2021 Myanmar military coup; Wikipedia notes that weapons and explosives were in his possession. Burmese outlets reported that he died in military custody on April 26, 2023, with his family told in July 2023; reports, including Bloody Elbow's, said he may have been tortured in custody. The death has never been officially confirmed.
The clinch is where Lethwei lives. Any fighter can throw punches at range. It is in the clinch — where elbows, knees, and headbutts converge at zero distance — that the art reveals its true nature.
KYAR BA NYEIN
"The Tiger"
1923–1979 · Myanmar · Pioneer of Modern Lethwei · 1952 Olympian
No discussion of Lethwei's greatest figures can leave out Kyar Ba Nyein. Born in Mandalay in 1923, he started boxing at thirteen and fought roughly fifty bouts over twenty years before retiring at thirty-three. In 1951 he defeated Indian featherweight champion Benoy Bose, a result that earned him a place on Burma's boxing team at the 1952 Helsinki Olympics, where he lost his preliminary bout to Poland's Leszek Drogosz by decision.
Kyar Ba Nyein is credited as the pioneer who drew up the modern, scientific rules used for Lethwei since 1953. He traveled across Myanmar, especially Mon and Karen States where the traditional sport was most actively practiced, trained with local fighters, and brought some of them back to Mandalay and Yangon to compete under the new methods. He later led a delegation of around 100 Burmese boxers to Beijing and Shanghai in 1960 to demonstrate Lethwei at the signing of the Burma–China border treaty.
Kyar Ba Nyein died in Yangon on July 8, 1979, of rectal cancer. The scientific rules he helped establish in the 1950s — later built on by the Myanmar Traditional Lethwei Federation, which added the modern tournament ruleset for the Golden Belt Championship in 1996 — remain the foundation that today's Golden Belt and WLC bouts are fought under.
CYRUS WASHINGTON
"The American Pioneer"
United States · International Lethwei Pioneer
Born October 28, 1983 in Saginaw, Michigan, Cyrus Washington was an accomplished American kickboxer and Muay Thai fighter — a former WKA, WMF and PK-1 Muay Thai world champion — before he became one of the first foreigners to compete regularly in Lethwei. He made his Lethwei debut on September 26, 2010, drawing with then-Openweight champion Saw Nga Man in Yangon.
Washington's three fights with Tun Tun Min, all contested as exhibitions with no title at stake, ran from December 2014 to December 2015. In the first, on December 7, 2014, Washington knocked Tun Tun Min out in round three — only the second time in the trilogy's history a foreigner had beaten Myanmar's champion. Tun Tun Min won the next two: a round-five stoppage on April 11, 2015, and a 71-second finish on December 20, 2015, after Washington declined to continue past his injury time-out.
Washington went on to fight Too Too to a seven-round draw in July 2015, and later challenged Dave Leduc twice for the Golden Belt: a draw in Yangon on August 20, 2017, and a TKO loss in a rematch in Cheyenne, Wyoming on November 7, 2020 — the first Lethwei world title fight held in North America.
Washington's willingness to travel to Myanmar and compete under authentic rules, years before the World Lethwei Championship existed, helped demonstrate that Lethwei could be contested at a high level by fighters from outside the country.
INTERNATIONAL FIGHTERS
The story of Lethwei's globalization is not the story of one or two fighters but of a growing wave of international athletes who have traveled to Myanmar, trained in the art, and carried it back to their home countries. While Leduc and Washington were the pioneers, they were followed by a diverse group of fighters from Europe, Australia, and beyond, each contributing to the sport's expanding footprint.
ARTUR SALADIAK
Poland · First Non-Myanmar WLC World Champion
Born March 15, 1991 in Mirosławiec, Poland, Artur Saladiak built his early career on the British Muay Thai and kickboxing circuit, fighting out of FSC Muay Thai. He made his Lethwei debut on June 10, 2017 at WLC 2, beating Myanmar's Soe Lin Oo by unanimous decision.
On June 2, 2018, Saladiak knocked out Saw Ba Oo in round four to win the inaugural WLC Light Middleweight World Championship — making him, by date, the WLC's first non-Myanmar world champion. He lost the title in his first defense, to Ukraine's Sasha Moisa by unanimous decision on August 2, 2019.
Saladiak continued competing in kickboxing (including in Glory) and Lethwei afterward, and headlined the first sanctioned Lethwei event held in Poland in May 2021.
SASHA MOISA
Ukraine · WLC Light Middleweight Champion
Sasha Moisa — born Oleksandr Moisa on September 10, 1994 in Odesa, Ukraine — trained in judo from age thirteen before switching to Muay Thai at eighteen and relocating to Bangkok in 2016 to train full-time. He won the WMC Super Welterweight Muay Thai world title in October 2018.
Moisa made his Lethwei debut in February 2019 at WLC 7, knocking out Myanmar's Shwe Yar Man in round three. In just his second Lethwei bout, on August 2, 2019 at WLC 9, he beat Artur Saladiak by unanimous decision to become WLC Light Middleweight World Champion.
His documented Lethwei record is 2-0-0. He held the Light Middleweight title from August 2, 2019 until February 1, 2021, when the championship ceased in the wake of the February 2021 coup. In mixed martial arts his record stood at 5-2 after KSW 116 on March 14, 2026.
ADEM YILMAZ
Turkey / Australia · Early International Challenger
Adem Yilmaz, a Turkish-Australian fighter, was among the early international challengers to face Myanmar's biggest Lethwei names. Tun Tun Min knocked him out at the end of round five at the Lethwei Grand Prix in Japan on October 27, 2016, in Tokyo.
On April 18, 2017, Yilmaz fought Dave Leduc to a five-round draw in Tokyo, in a Golden Belt title defense billed as the first Lethwei world title fight to headline two non-Burmese fighters.
Each new country that produces a competitive Lethwei fighter — Poland, Ukraine, the United States, Canada, Australia and more — adds another thread to the sport's global footprint, a process accelerated by the World Lethwei Championship's international title fights from 2017 onward.
THE FOUR GREATEST FIGHTS IN LETHWEI HISTORY
Lethwei's history is written in blood and courage. The following four bouts, drawn from the sport's official records, stand out for defining eras and driving Lethwei's spread beyond Myanmar.
1. Dave Leduc vs. Tun Tun Min III — “The Biggest Fight in Lethwei History” (2018)
The rubber match of Lethwei's defining rivalry, held December 16, 2018 at a sold-out Thein Pyu Stadium in Yangon. Early in round one, Leduc floored Tun Tun Min with a headbutt in the clinch; Tun Tun Min beat the count. Leduc then landed an elbow that knocked Tun Tun Min down again, and his corner called the two-minute injury time-out. Tun Tun Min recovered and fought on, and after five rounds with no further knockout the bout was declared a draw under traditional rules, with Leduc retaining the Golden Belt. The fight drew a cumulative audience of 37 million — the highest viewership in Lethwei history.
2. Dave Leduc vs. Tun Tun Min I — The Draw That Started It (2016)
Before the belt changed hands, there was the draw. On October 9, 2016 in Yangon, Myanmar's reigning champion faced the Canadian challenger for the first time. Tun Tun Min dominated the early rounds; Leduc rallied later. Neither man was knocked out, and the fight was declared a draw under traditional rules. It set up the rematch that cost Tun Tun Min his title two months later, and the trilogy decider two years after that.
3. Cyrus Washington vs. Tun Tun Min I — The First Upset (2014)
Two years before Leduc arrived, an American fighter had already shown Myanmar's champion could be beaten. On December 7, 2014, in an exhibition bout with no title at stake, Cyrus Washington knocked Tun Tun Min out in round three at the inaugural Air KBZ Aung Lan Championship in Yangon — even Tun Tun Min's injury time-out could not save him. Tun Tun Min won their next two meetings, but Washington's win stood as an early proof that foreign fighters could compete with Myanmar's best under Lethwei's own rules.
4. Sasha Moisa vs. Artur Saladiak — A New World Champion (2019)
On August 2, 2019 at WLC 9: King of Nine Limbs in Mandalay, Ukraine's Sasha Moisa challenged reigning WLC Light Middleweight World Champion Artur Saladiak of Poland. Moisa won by unanimous decision after five rounds — in just his second professional Lethwei bout — to become champion. He held the title until February 1, 2021, when the championship ceased in the wake of the February 2021 coup.
Women in Lethwei
Lethwei has historically been a male-dominated sport — in the traditional village-festival era, participation was open to any male fighter, noble or commoner — but women's involvement has grown in recent decades. Burmese media began covering women taking part in Myanmar's traditional bareknuckle festival scene by the mid-2010s, and the sport has continued to open up since.
The World Lethwei Championship added an official Women's Bantamweight World Championship, first won by France's Souris Manfredi, who defeated Maisha Katz on August 28, 2020 at WLC 12. It remains the WLC's only dedicated women's title to date.
The fighters profiled in this chapter represent different eras, different nationalities, and different fighting philosophies, but they share a common thread: each of them chose Lethwei when easier paths were available. They could have competed in sports with bigger purses, larger audiences, and softer rules. Instead, they chose the art that asks the most of its practitioners — the art where there are no gloves to hide behind, no judges to bail you out, and no victory without a knockout.
Their stories are Lethwei's story. From Kyar Ba Nyein's post-Olympic mission to modernize a folk tradition, through Tun Tun Min's eighteen Golden Belt defenses, to the trilogy he fought with Dave Leduc, the narrative arc of the sport is inseparable from the people who have bled for it. New chapters are being written every day, in gyms across Myanmar and in training camps from Eastern Europe to North America. The next great Lethwei fighter may already be wrapping their hands for the first time.
What these profiles collectively demonstrate is that Lethwei has always been a sport that transforms its practitioners. Leduc arrived as an MMA fighter and became a cultural ambassador. Washington came as a curious outsider and left as a respected warrior. Saladiak and Moisa translated European striking into bareknuckle mastery. Yilmaz fought Myanmar's biggest names in Tokyo years before the World Lethwei Championship gave international competition a formal home. Too Too showed that quiet technical brilliance could coexist with the sport's violent reputation. And Kyar Ba Nyein, a pioneer decades before any of them, demonstrated that tradition and modernization need not be enemies — that a sport can evolve without losing its soul.
The common thread is sacrifice. Every fighter profiled here paid a physical price for their achievements — broken bones, scar tissue, concussions, and the accumulated toll of years spent trading bareknuckle strikes with the most dangerous fighters on the planet. They paid a personal price as well, spending months away from families and home countries, training in conditions that would be unacceptable in any mainstream Western sport, and competing for purses that rarely matched the risk. They did it because Lethwei offered something that no amount of money could buy: the knowledge that when the hand wraps come off and the cuts are stitched, they had tested themselves in the most honest arena combat sports has to offer. That is the legacy these fighters share, and it is the legacy they pass on to everyone who follows them into the ring.