Karate Champs

[Great Sage]

I have much respect for guys like Howard Jackson, Chuck Norris, Jim Kelly and maybe even Joe Lewis... They were great fighters during their time - during the prime of point fighting and tournaments. With that in mind, I don't consider them "World Champions" of fighting as they saw themselves.

Back then, there was a naive assumption that if you won a Karate Tournament in the USA, you were a world champion. For instance, as good a fighter as Chuck Norris was, he would have gotten ripped up in Thailand.

As a matter of fact, here's an interesting story. Don "the Dragon" Wilson became a kickboxing champion and considered himself the best... However, people began talking about how much tougher Muay Thai was than Kickboxing. Don took the challenge and fought in Thailand. After one round, the Dragon didn't know where he was.

Thailand was the only place where Benny the Jet didn't win a match... It was a draw. And I doubt Joe Lewis, Bill Wallace or any other karate champ would have done better.

I also recall in the UFC how a guy with 15 years of karate couldn't even harm a hair on the BJJ guy. I've also witnessed a blue belt judo guy toss a 3rd Dan karate guy like he was a salad. So maybe all this backlash against karate does have some truth.

[Guest]

Of course it has truth. But let's not flog it to death.....

[Tom Yum]

A good fighter can come from any style. I guess it just happens that certain styles attract better fighters than others. In the 70's people only knew of karate and kung fu as the stand up arts, but would never consider themselves in the same class as boxers until they (boxers) started to learn a few basic kicks and began KO ing karate guys in the 80's.

Then American kickboxers (full-contact karate) thought they were at the top of the game until they were introduced to Muay Thai. By that time, Muay Thai fighters had allready KOd the best Chinese gong fu masters and the Europeans and Braziliians allready discovered Muay Thai and brought it home.

On an unrelated note, I read that during the filming of the Big Boss, Bruce Lee was challenged by a thai boxer and won, but got hurt with some devastating knees from the clinch...this is not verfifiable though.

Karate (like TKD) has lost some of its quality control as a fighting style. I think as an art, it has a lot of things to offer - conditioning, flexibility, discipline,focus, respect and honour. There are still good fighters from different karate styles (look at Manson Gibson or Bill Wallace!), but I don't think a majority of karateka train at the same level or with the same preparation as MT or MMA. Hence the average karateka has not prepaired himself technique wise or through conditioning to fight a MT boxer or MMA.

The only karateka that I can think of that has trained to fight in full-contact MT and who has won against the Thais is Manson Gibson (3rd Dan in Kenpo?), whom has KOd thaiboxers with his fancy spinning kicks and spinning backfists.

[Bau13]

hey just look at K-1 ,,,, theres a bunch of Karate guys - Andy Hug(RIP!), Sam Greco, Francisco Filho ,Musashi,Taei Kin who can whoop any MT guys ass ..

Most of them trained Seido Kaikan Karate (it borrowed ALOT of techniques from Muay Thai...) basically a more practical form of Karate for the kickboxing ring....

You still see the odd fancy kick thrown when these guys fight ...and they use them very well!!

Andy's axe kick was great!

[brokenelbow]

They were champions of Full contact karate, not muay thai. Both used a different set of rules. Did a Muay Thai fighter ever become a champion under full contact karate rules?

[Tom Yum]

I'm not sure?? I think full contact karate is not as mainstream as it used to be, but I think the PKA association is the next best thing I suppose.

I know of a few guys that have backgrounds in san shou and MT that have done really well in American Kickboxing...

[Bau13]

um... I didn't say they were muay thai champions....

I think they could beat the MT guys tho... BUT it depends on when you decide to match them up... before or after they cross-trained in K-1!!!

All of the Karate fighters I mentioned had trouble adjusting into K-1 early in their careers.

But Karate in Japan has evolved ALOT and I think many karatekas can hold their own against Muay Thai now...

This thread is just gonna go to the "No art is complete" thing again....

[Toudiyama[NL]]

Bau13

Seido is an offshoot of Kyokushin karate (like Enshin and Ashihara) Kyokushin RE-introduced lowkick into karate after all but one Kyukushin fighter got beaten by the thais( they fought on thai rules with gloves though)
european Kickboxing is related to kyokushin in the fact that kurosaki started the Mejirogym (Kurosaki was one the one that didn't lose) Jan Plas from Holland a kyokushin fighter took it with him to Holland and organized fights against Chakuriki, at that time a weird Karateschool whose fighters were disqualified at most tournament for lack of control and excessive contact
Harinck of Chakuriki went to thailand and took Thaiboxing with him and actually at that time the only difference between fights was the bloody anoying music
Elbows were taken out of both because there was the risk the state would forbid the sport if they weren't

Because of this a lot of US fighters got their butt kicked by dutch fighter they didn't know the power of the lowkick hitting time and time again

these pioneers weren't dissatisfied with the arts they did but with the way the matches were scored and blind judges, knock outs show it better ( although at that time the only way a dutch fighter could win in England or France)
Fred royers was a Wado karate champion and even when a kickboxing champ still competed in wuko karate tournaments

[Bau13]

hey Toudiyama....I knew about most of what you were talkin about but its nice to read it in such detail !

I didn't know chakuriki used to be a karate schooll!!

What you wrote is like the history of the great K-1 fighters gyms..

[Toudiyama[NL]]

Thom Harinck the founder of Chakuriki was an orange belt Kyokushin when he left and started his own school
If you ever can take a look at the book he wrote you will see that the techniques used are basic kyokushin techniques

K1 fighters from Europe are usually somehow related to the 2 schools I mentioned ( mejiro Amsterdam and Chakuriki)

[kengar]

the 1st fighter in the UFC to give Royce Gracie a fight and test him was Kieth Hackney who at the time did Kempo Karate. He was able to stay on his feet and avoid the take down at the first part of the fight. That is the weakness of most standup fighters, they don't know how to avoid the take down then find themselves trapped on the bottom. I guess we all know that.
Chuck Liddell is a kickboxer and he likes and wants to stay on his feet and bang. Check out his interviews, his game is to avoid the take down and knock his opponent out.

[Thai Bri]

test

[Tom Yum]

Keith Hackney learned the sprawl and used it twice against Gracie in that fight. From the sprawl and during the seperation, he threw a lot of hook palm strikes and uppercuts. It left a cut under Gracie's eye if I remember correctly.

Chuck Lidell, Mo Smith, Sakuraba and others made grapplers realize that stand up is important too.

[Bau13]

Hell yeah! My favourite fighter Peter Aerts trained in both Chakuriki and Mejiro!

[Tom Yum]

I'll have to go with Ernesto Hoost, who got a start in Sokudo gym. His sharp, explosive boxing skills baffle most fighters!