Fightlab Flo Muay Thai Boxing Gloves (16oz) Review
Brand
Fightlab is a Thai brand founded in Phuket in 2010. They quickly gained exposure due to one of their stores close proximity to the well-known Tiger Muay Thai and MMA training centre, which has made Fightlab one of the fastest growing fight gear brands in the world. With sponsored athletes competing in top organisations like the UFC and Bellator, they’ve become well known for producing high quality equipment from Gi’s and rashguards to boxing gloves and muay thai shorts. More recently Fightlab have turned their attention to the UK to increase their customer base here.
Fightlab sent us a pair of these gloves to test out and provide our feedback for them.
About the gloves
The Flo Muay Thai gloves are one of four main designs that Fightlab currently stock, the other three being the Classic Gloves, the Force Gloves and the Sak Tiger Gloves, although some other designs are also available. The Flo gloves are made to be used in Boxing, Muay Thai, Kickboxing and MMA striking training, are available in 8-16oz’s and come in a range of colours.
Weight and distribution
These gloves were designed as Muay Thai gloves, so they’re designed to be more flexible in the fingers to allow you to grip your opponent in the clinch – because of this the palm of the glove is very thin and the padding is obviously across the back and knuckles of the glove. The thing I noticed about these gloves is the thickness of the padding across the back of the hand/thumb, there’s a thumb width ridge above the wrist strap. I’ll get to it later in the review, but I feel like this provides some extra protection when you’ve got your guard up blocking punches.
Visuals
I love how these gloves look. Fightlab have based the design of them on the fluid movements of Muay Thai fighters in the ring, and the results are great. I tested out the black/yellow versions (you can also find black/white, red/white and blue/white on the Fightlab website) and I love the way the pattern curves up the back of the glove, flowing like the name suggests. Across the back of the ‘Fightlab’ is printed, whist the wrist strap has the Fightlab Muay Thai logo stitched on. The only drawback is the relatively limited colour range – it would be nice to see more options similar to the Thai Flag variants of the gloves.
Below you can find our Fight Gear Focus video giving you a close-up, visual look at these Gloves. Make sure you check out the rest of the video series and Subscribe to our YouTube channel so you don’t miss any of our future videos.
Materials
These gloves are made of 100% genuine leather, meaning they’re going to be very durable. It’s a little stiff at first but breaks in nicely. The inside of the glove is lined with a soft, silky material that adds to the comfort of the glove. The velcro strap is wide and long, looping entirely round the wrist to provide plenty of support, however my training partners have said that the velcro can rub during clinch training.
Craftsmanship
The craftsmanship is one of the strongest points of these gloves, Fightlab have done an excellent job. They’re handmade in Thailand, and the quality is exceptional. Fightlab proudly boast that they’re triple stitched, and the stitching is extremely neat and not one stitch has worked loose during my testing. The leather is also spread evenly across the glove, it doesn’t bunch up anywhere and is evenly spread around the bend of the fingers and thumb.
I’d rate the craftsmanship on these gloves as some of the best I’ve tested, certainly on a par with the other major Thai brands like Yokkao and Fairtex.
Comfort/use
It’s been a pleasure using these gloves, they’re nice and flexible, which meant they didn’t need a huge amount of breaking in, and have proven to be ideal for Muay Thai clinch work. The padding is nice and thick (I tested a 16oz version) which meant I could throw full power at the pads with confidence that it wouldn’t be painful. As I mentioned earlier the padding is the same thickness all across the back of the glove, meaning that in sparring they provide extra protection when blocking strikes, which I found was a great bonus when sparring or during Dutch Drills. This padding strikes me as being quite similar to the Danger Equipment Deluxe Ultimate Fighter Sparring Gloves we tried out previously (check the review out here), although this extra protection feels more integrated into the Fightlab gloves.
In my mind the only drawback to these gloves is that the inner lining that makes them so comfortable around the hand doesn’t extend down the wrist (the inside of the wrist strap is just leather). This is a tiny complaint though, and the absence of the material on the inside of the wrist doesn’t do anything to significantly take away from the overall comfort of the glove.
Cost
Available on the Fightlab website at £100 they aren’t budget gloves by any stretch of the imagination. However they are also extremely well made gloves that use top quality materials, seem very durable and are nice and comfortable to wear – all of which means they’re not bad value for money. The price is probably going to put off a beginner looking for their first pair of gloves, but an intermediate/advanced fighter looking for a new pair of gloves couldn’t go far wrong with a pair of these Flo Muay Thai Gloves
As I mentioned before Fightlab are trying to expand their UK operations, and as a result any orders that are placed before 3pm will get next day UK delivery, making a new pair of gloves even more tempting.
Looking to buy these?
Pros/Cons
+ Very well made
+ Beautiful design
+ Very well padded
– Fairly limited colour range
– No inner lining around the wrist
