It's 2009.

Carlos Coello

, a 19-year-old boy from Cádiz, is in a Business Administration and Management (ADE) class at the University of Seville.

What am I doing here? He wonders.

In the future, whether you do well or do poorly, an office or a cubicle, an armchair or a chair await you, in short, eight hours a day await you locked between computers.

Decides to quit.

"I don't want to have a normal job," he convinces himself.

And, without further ado, he goes to Thailand.

Why?

Still today

does not know very well.

A couple of years before entering university, he had started practicing martial arts, had seen the movie Kickboxer many times by

Jean Claude Van Damme

, a friend convinced him of the opportunities of the Asian country ... The fact is that, without English or contacts, he planted himself in Bangkok in search of a gym to learn Muay Thai. It is 2020. In the next few days, Coello will fight for his fourth world champion belt The road seems easy, one of those success stories, but it has a trick: you had to insist, and insist, and insist, and insist, and insist.

«Since that first trip in 2009 I spent five years going and coming, trying everything.

I came to Cádiz, I worked in security, I taught Muay Thai, I saved a little, and I returned to Thailand to fight in all the fights that came my way.

It cost me money, sometimes I fought against opponents of more weight, but I just wanted an opportunity, "he says and recalls that that opportunity came to him in 2014.

The manager of an adversary

The scene could star Van Damme himself.

In his longest stay in Thailand, Coello managed to get into the ring of Bangkok's Lumpinee Stadium, the epicenter of this sport that allows contact with fists, feet, knees and elbows, and after the victory, the opponent's manager offered him a contract.

The Italian

Roberto Gallo-Cassarino

, owner of the 7 Muay Thai gym in Rayong, saw in the Spanish a future champion and, without the prejudices of the Thai businessmen, decided to bet on him.

He promised room and board in exchange for a percentage of his income.

At first I was competing for bags of 30 or 40 euros, now ... «Now I can live well.

Since 2015 I have been living here in Thailand, where the cost of living is lower, and I have competed in major events.

I have even created a clothing brand and have been a promoter of various events, especially in Spain, "he says while waiting on the phone.

He had to fight this Friday, Christmas Day, but a case of coronavirus delayed what should be the most important fight of his life, because he already placed three world champion belts, but he always did it in Spain and against western rivals.

As soon as possible, he will fight at the World Siam stadium in Bangkok and will do it against the local

Paruhatlek Nakbinlatkrabang

in an evening that, in the event of victory, will open the doors to the One Championship, the largest promoter of martial arts in Asia. “I have the thorn in the World Cup that I lost last year here in Thailand, on the day of Nai Khanom Tom -father of Muay Thai-, and before a local fighter.

This time the result has to be different, ”explains Coello, who only stopped fighting for a while in 2014 to take care of his mother.

It was precisely after receiving Gallo-Cassarino's offer that he learned about cancer and postponed his leap to professionalism until, unfortunately, he said goodbye to his mother.

Since then he has close relationships with various cancer associations, as well as with Cádiz, the club of his loves, with which he has carried out several campaigns. His future is to continue rising in competitions in Thailand, to organize evenings in the post-covid era and for trying to set up a gym in Cádiz.

"Would be a dream.

I would do it even if I did not earn just, the minimum to live, but it seems like a suicidal project.

The price of land is very expensive and people do not have much, there is too much unemployment ”, concludes Coello.

More than a decade later, something remains of that 19-year-old boy who was studying Business Administration and Management (ADE) at the University of Seville, but it is another.

He didn't want to have a normal job and he definitely doesn't.

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