Vietnamese boxer wins historic gold medal after defeating world champion in Europe

Bui Yen Ly, born in 1995, is the number one female Muay Thai fighter in Vietnam, having won many titles at world, Asian and SEA Games tournaments. Bui Yen Ly has a huge collection of titles, including the Muay Thai Gold Medal at the 2017 World Games.

Muay Thai has not yet been included in the Olympics despite the campaign of the Federation of Muay Thai Associations. The 2024 Olympics still do not have Muay Thai and those who love this martial art can only hope for the future.

However, Muay Thai has appeared in the World Games, an Olympic-like tournament held every 4 years with sports and events not included in the Olympic system. 2017 was the first time Muay Thai was included in the World Games. At that time, this tournament was held in Wroclaw (Poland).

That year's World Games had more than 3,000 athletes from 111 countries and territories competing in 31 sports. The Vietnamese delegation only sent 6 athletes, competing in 4 sports including: diving (1 athlete), Jujitsu (2 athletes, women's doubles), Billiards (Tran Quyet Chien - 3-cushion carom) and Muay Thai (athletes Vo Van Dai and Bui Yen Ly).

Bui Yen Ly competed in the 51 kg category. She overcame a series of opponents such as Atenea Flores (Spain) in the quarter-finals, Gabriela Kuzawinska (Poland) in the semi-finals and finally defeated Apasara Koson (Thailand), a fighter from her native country of Muay Thai, in the final.

Koson Apasara was the reigning world champion at the time. The Thai fighter was aiming for a hat-trick of gold medals as she had won the national Muay Thai youth championship and then the world championship in 2017.

However, in the final match of the women's 51kg Muay Thai, Bui Yen Ly was awarded the victory by the judges in all 3 rounds and won the final score of 30-27 to become the first Vietnamese Muay Thai fighter to win the World Games championship, and at the same time helped the Vietnamese sports delegation win the only Gold Medal in this tournament.

Bui Yen Ly's Gold Medal is a historic achievement for Vietnamese sports. It took 5 years for Vietnam to win its second Gold Medal in Muay at the 2022 World Games thanks to Nguyen Tran Duy Nhat.

The International Muaythai Federation's homepage at that time said that Koson Apasara was disappointed to win the Silver Medal, but the Thai female boxer was also proud that boxers from other countries came to compete in her country's martial art: "At the 2017 World Games in Wroclaw, Koson Apasara faced Bui Yen Ly from Vietnam in an exciting final match. In the end, Koson won the Silver Medal. Koson said that at that time she was very disappointed but still very proud to see other countries participating in her national sport."

During her career, Bui Yen Ly has won 16 Gold Medals at the Muay Thai Championship and National Cup, 16 Gold Medals at the Kickboxing Championship and National Cup, 4 SEA Games Gold Medals, Third Class Labor Medal... She is known as the "Invincible" of women's Muay Thai. In addition, Bui Yen Ly was also honored as the best female athlete of 2019 at the World Muay Thai Championship (IFMA)./.