Kyokushin: Your face=punch magnet?

[Azam]

Don't alot of the European Kyokushin champions already cross train in MT,Kickboxing,etc? Seems like alot of the Kyokushin clubs do that [The club my former Oyama Karate teacher came from had MT classes as well]

Not the KK gyms I've been too. I think it's safe to say that it's pretty much the same from the UK.

I don't think it's common either that much in Europe. There are some gyms that do - but the vast majority don't.

I think the European champs that do cross train in MT/kickboxing do so because they might want to pursue careers in kickboxing or MT - as there is very little money to be made competing in KK.

If it's an offshoot style then I think you're more likely to find kickboxing/MT or something else. Oyama Karate aren't strictly knockdown karate - so I'm not surprised to hear that MT is also taught in your case.

 

[SAMURAI SPIRIT]

As a Kyokushin guy I agree with the general premise. If we are talking gloved tournaments like MMA or Muay Thai then you are correct. Andy Hug was one of the best Kyokushin fighters that ever lived. He had to get used to face punching. His Kyokushin training had prepared him enough to defend face punches from some untrained doofus but when you go against kick boxers like Peter Aerts then Kyokushin's face punching and blocking is really not up to the same level as boxing or Muay Thai. But the question is a bit misplaced because by answering it directly we are missing the big picture here. The philosophy of Kyokushin!

Mas Oyama believed that in a street fight, only untrained people will throw punches to the head. To him, the body was a bigger and softer target and a well placed blow with the front two knuckles would immediately end the fight. It suited the "one punch one kill" mindset more than boxing combinations.

My Sensei was Shihan Inamullah Khan, a direct disciple of Mas Oyama. He would throw a coconut at me and ask me to punch it without gloves. I would hesitate because coconut is hard. "This is what your opponents forehead could feel like after you connect to it bare knuckle!" He would say.

This point was demonstrated in early UFCs where there were no gloves. Strikers would break their hands before the knockout even happened. Keith Hackney a Kenpo master was pounding Emanuel Yarbrough and watch how he breaks his own hand. There were so many hand injuries in early UFCs that in order to keep strikers in business, gloves were introduced. This is exactly what Mas Oyama has been saying. In the world of bare-knuckle full contact, body shots are the way to go. There is a reason why fighters wrap their hands. Those things break very easily.

Remove the gloves and Kyokushin guy is invincible!!! He is going to come straight at you like a charging bull. You may connect a couple of times to the face and if that happens you better hope you knock him out. If not then he will aim for your body. If you block, he breaks your arm if you do not block he breaks your ribs! You decide how you want to go down but you will go down. The Kyokushin guy will walk away with a black eye while you are carried away with broken ribs. Remove the gloves and the hand wraps and it is really that simple.

 

[ARIZE]

Remove the gloves and Kyokushin guy is invincible!!! He is going to come straight at you like a charging bull.

Except probably against someone who knows how to use elbows, clinching, trips, and his body is conditioned from taking shins and knees...
If only there was a sport like that...

(don't mind me, I'm just trolling through)

 

[j123]

Except probably against someone who knows how to use elbows, clinching, trips, and his body is conditioned from taking shins and knees...
If only there was a sport like that...

Boxing?

 

[JustOnce]

I know many fighters (Bas, GSP, Semmy...) with solid or even top striking praise kyokushin as one of the best TMA to train striking. I disagree.

(*I have background in Goju Ryu, ATA TKD, Kyokushin and several street fights )

Based on my personal experience Kyokushin provides exelent kicks, toughness, cardio, and teaches you to punch bareknucle so you get great technique and dont fuck up your knuckles and wrists.

BUT IT TURNS YOUR HEAD INTO A PUNCH MAGNET. I realized this the worst way, in the streets.
because since theres no punches to the head in kyokushin you dont train head movement. You are supposed to mainly block with your elbows or forearms. Some would argue thats good training for mma because of the small gloves but to train a MA where theres no punching to the head and no training head movement isnt practical.

IMO theres no reason to choose to train Kyokushin instead of Muay Thai.
I would assume fighters who recommend Kyokushin and have Kyokushin experience know what im talking about.

Of course maybe im missing something. Anyone with kyokushin training agrees?

PD: Im not a violent person, in fact the opposite so when I include streetfights in my background its because thats when ive tested my training in "reality" and got my face broken a couple times since I didnt move my friggin head.

 

[eternaldarkness]

I think I know this.

Escapes / sweep attempts were failing, so rather than eat bombs for the rest of the round, he gave up his back to work something from there even if it was a bad spot. To be fair, getting choked out and losing by tap out is much less damaging than eating full force strikes for X amount of time. The latter depending on how vicious, could leave you with facial reconstructive surgery.

inb4 pussy



Ronda gets lit up and tagged: You're doing great, she's scared of you!

the funny thing was he never even gave the back up. he just turned away enough to expose his neck.

 

[j123]

the funny thing was he never even gave the back up. he just turned away enough to expose his neck.

lol, its like he was going for the escape to half guard, but forgot to do the half guard part

 

[Azam]

You're using Francisco Filho as an example of good boxing in K1?

You do realize along with Hug - they had awful boxing even with many years of cross training in boxing/kickboxing to fill up the holes.

Watch Hug's first few kickboxing fights and see how he struggled with boxing.

Filho didn't have as much problems as all the other kyokushin based kickboxers because he smartly stayed at kicking range & actively avoided getting drawn into punch exchanges. Like with the Hunt gif - although there were still many instances where he struggled when he couldn't avoid punching exchanges like with Bernardo & Le Banner.

 

[Azam]

As a Kyokushin guy I agree with the general premise. If we are talking gloved tournaments like MMA or Muay Thai then you are correct. Andy Hug was one of the best Kyokushin fighters that ever lived. He had to get used to face punching. His Kyokushin training had prepared him enough to defend face punches from some untrained doofus but when you go against kick boxers like Peter Aerts then Kyokushin's face punching and blocking is really not up to the same level as boxing or Muay Thai. But the question is a bit misplaced because by answering it directly we are missing the big picture here. The philosophy of Kyokushin!

Mas Oyama believed that in a street fight, only untrained people will throw punches to the head. To him, the body was a bigger and softer target and a well placed blow with the front two knuckles would immediately end the fight. It suited the "one punch one kill" mindset more than boxing combinations.

My Sensei was Shihan Inamullah Khan, a direct disciple of Mas Oyama. He would throw a coconut at me and ask me to punch it without gloves. I would hesitate because coconut is hard. "This is what your opponents forehead could feel like after you connect to it bare knuckle!" He would say.

This point was demonstrated in early UFCs where there were no gloves. Strikers would break their hands before the knockout even happened. Keith Hackney a Kenpo master was pounding Emanuel Yarbrough and watch how he breaks his own hand. There were so many hand injuries in early UFCs that in order to keep strikers in business, gloves were introduced. This is exactly what Mas Oyama has been saying. In the world of bare-knuckle full contact, body shots are the way to go. There is a reason why fighters wrap their hands. Those things break very easily.

Remove the gloves and Kyokushin guy is invincible!!! He is going to come straight at you like a charging bull. You may connect a couple of times to the face and if that happens you better hope you knock him out. If not then he will aim for your body. If you block, he breaks your arm if you do not block he breaks your ribs! You decide how you want to go down but you will go down. The Kyokushin guy will walk away with a black eye while you are carried away with broken ribs. Remove the gloves and the hand wraps and it is really that simple.

Andy Hug was a professional fighter so I don't think you can apply that standard to casual people training. I think for the casual person training for sure they'd be in better physical condition, mentally stronger than the average joe and that's as far as you can go with that line of thought. I think most people strike to the face whether knowingly or unknowingly in street altercations - for someone that doesn't really engage in boxing or face punching - dealing with that can be an issue if you can't put the person down right away. If you can - then no problem.

It's easy though to demonstrate what is being said by taking someone who's done kyokushin for a few years and getting them to spar with someone with a year of mt/kickboxing/mma/kudo training - I think you'd be surprised how often they'd eat punches to the face when sparring someone with less martial arts experience. I've seen it multiple times first hand - and have experienced it when I switched to kudo although it wasn't nearly as bad for me as I wasn't pure kyokushin.

Karate means open hand - it literally has techniques to strike to the head/face without breaking your hands. It's in the name. Also if you aim for the chin/jaw your knuckles will most likely not break - there are many instances of boxers being able to defend themselves without breaking their hands. So I personally don't buy that. Sure your hands might hurt though.

Mas Oyama while I respect what he did - I think he was a bit clueless about some aspects of karate. My opinion has changed a lot about him since learning more - he was more of a fighter than an instructor. Anyone with any experience in karate should read his book - this is karate or Mas Oyama's karate - the uke/open hand techniques & even kata will make you realise why kyokushin is the way it is.

The reason fighters have to wrap their hands is because both men are trained martial artists/fighters. Fights will inevitably be much more competitive than fighting someone with no martial arts experience and fights will also last longer - hence wrapping your hands. I mean type street fights into youtube and you'll see countless people being knocked out by punches to the face...


TBH Kyokushin is not invincible. No martial art is though to say kyokushin is invincible is nonsense.

People who do kyokushin have very unrealistic expectations of what kyokushin can do. I know for a fact that many of my kyokushin instructors would probably be choked unconscious by a guy training mma for 2 years. It is what it is.

 

[Jimmy Jazz]

Andy Hug was a professional fighter so I don't think you can apply that standard to casual people training. I think for the casual person training for sure they'd be in better physical condition, mentally stronger than the average joe and that's as far as you can go with that line of thought. I think most people strike to the face whether knowingly or unknowingly in street altercations - for someone that doesn't really engage in boxing or face punching - dealing with that can be an issue if you can't put the person down right away. If you can - then no problem.

It's easy though to demonstrate what is being said by taking someone who's done kyokushin for a few years and getting them to spar with someone with a year of mt/kickboxing/mma/kudo training - I think you'd be surprised how often they'd eat punches to the face when sparring someone with less martial arts experience. I've seen it multiple times first hand - and have experienced it when I switched to kudo although it wasn't nearly as bad for me as I wasn't pure kyokushin.

Karate means open hand - it literally has techniques to strike to the head/face without breaking your hands. It's in the name. Also if you aim for the chin/jaw your knuckles will most likely not break - there are many instances of boxers being able to defend themselves without breaking their hands. So I personally don't buy that. Sure your hands might hurt though.

Mas Oyama while I respect what he did - I think he was a bit clueless about some aspects of karate. My opinion has changed a lot about him since learning more - he was more of a fighter than an instructor. Anyone with any experience in karate should read his book - this is karate or Mas Oyama's karate - the uke/open hand techniques & even kata will make you realise why kyokushin is the way it is.

The reason fighters have to wrap their hands is because both men are trained martial artists/fighters. Fights will inevitably be much more competitive than fighting someone with no martial arts experience and fights will also last longer - hence wrapping your hands. I mean type street fights into youtube and you'll see countless people being knocked out by punches to the face...


TBH Kyokushin is not invincible. No martial art is though to say kyokushin is invincible is nonsense.

People who do kyokushin have very unrealistic expectations of what kyokushin can do. I know for a fact that many of my kyokushin instructors would probably be choked unconscious by a guy training mma for 2 years. It is what it is.

thats interesting what you said about oyama not being a great teacher. he doesnt seem to fight kyokushin style in this vid. looks like old karate.

 

[Thycidides]

I'm actually kind of bummed knockdown karate isn't more common in my area. It looks like a easier sport to compete in as an amateur than Mauy Thai.Only a small number of people at my MT gym compete in it, compared to the number that come to classes. I'm one of them. I kind of feel like a wimp because of that.

But I've done some hard MT sparring, with partners that didn't really care about my health. I kind of wonder if hard MT sparring is more brutal and dangerous than a local knockdown karate tournament.

Can anyone that has done both comment?

 

[Mad Titan]

Karate means open hand - it literally has techniques to strike to the head/face without breaking your hands. It's in the name.

Actually, I believe Karate translates to "empty hand" as in unarmed combat.

 

[moreorless87]

You're using Francisco Filho as an example of good boxing in K1?

You do realize along with Hug - they had awful boxing even with many years of cross training in boxing/kickboxing to fill up the holes.

Watch Hug's first few kickboxing fights and see how he struggled with boxing.

Filho didn't have as much problems as all the other kyokushin based kickboxers because he smartly stayed at kicking range & actively avoided getting drawn into punch exchanges. Like with the Hunt gif - although there were still many instances where he struggled when he couldn't avoid punching exchanges like with Bernardo & Le Banner.

Hug struggled early on but I think both men did develop effective if somewhat limited boxing.

Really though if your looking at training for MMA or K-1 style kickboxing I don't think having to add boxing to KK automatically means its not worth training the latter just that its skills are more specific. Often fighters with highly evolved very specific skills that they then round out end up being the most successful.

 

[biscuitsbrah]

Besides the face punching thing the worst part of KK to me is the lack of any real movement and footwork. Great tough sport though

 

[biscuitsbrah]

Boxing?

Pretty sure he was talking about tae kwon do bro

 

[j123]

Pretty sure he was talking about tae kwon do bro

Take my dough?

 

[Azam]

thats interesting what you said about oyama not being a great teacher. he doesnt seem to fight kyokushin style in this vid. looks like old karate.

I didn't say he wasn't a great teacher - just that he was more of a fighter than an instructor. You come across instructors that aren't particularly great at teaching fine technical points but know how to develop students that can fight. Oyama I feel fit that category.

Kyokushin is a great tough style but from a syllabus perspective it's a mess in my opinion. Understanding of kata is very poor, very few practitioners can apply the other 60% of techniques in the syllabus in sparring (open hand strikes & uke in particular). I think that generally speaking like @biscuitsbrah said movement/footwork is very poor (outside a rare few) because footwork/movement in kyokushin is specialised to knockdown karate competition - outside of that format it really is not so good.

I think it's not instructors that are at fault - I think Mas Oyama was clueless about lots of things in Karate or his instructors passed on their cluelessness to him. Read through some of Mas Oyama's early karate books - there are a lot of errors, dubious applications and descriptions of techniques that will make you think what? Unfortunately Mas Oyama didn't have the resources we have today (i.e. internet) otherwise I'm sure he would have changed it himself.

But all these things were passed on to his students and then from his students to their students etc. It's not just a problem in Kyokushin - there are a lot of these problems with a lot of karate styles in general. The only plus for kyokushin is that students who learn this style can fight - just not imo better than someone doing MMA, Muay Thai, Boxing or kickboxing.

 

[Azam]

Actually, I believe Karate translates to "empty hand" as in unarmed combat.

Oops - I think that might have been a typo.

 

[Azam]

Hug struggled early on but I think both men did develop effective if somewhat limited boxing.

Really though if your looking at training for MMA or K-1 style kickboxing I don't think having to add boxing to KK automatically means its not worth training the latter just that its skills are more specific. Often fighters with highly evolved very specific skills that they then round out end up being the most successful.

They did the best with that tools they had available. Specialisms are an advantage but you'll always be at a disadvantage if the style you learn operates at ranges/positions (without head punches) that don't cross over to kickboxing/mma/mt (kyokushin range is effectively inside/clinch range) - also training like that instills habits - habits are incredibly difficult to break once they are set. The sense of timing is something I feel KK guys struggle with when they cross to other styles because of the different range.

I think MMA, kickboxing or muay thai will get you much quicker results than learning kyokushin - after all with kk you have to go through a lot of kata, kihon, gradings etc. Kickboxing/MT training are very specialised to the demands of their respective sports so you'll spend most of your time working on things that work effectively in the ring. That's what I feel anyway.

 

[n.diazismylife1999]

Besides the face punching thing the worst part of KK to me is the lack of any real movement and footwork. Great tough sport though

Yeah, I think Enshin and Ashihara are much better versions of Kyokushin. Footwork, sabaki, is emphasized much more, the techniques are more varied (grabbing is allowed, sweeps and throws included, etc), and the kata are done with a partner instead of performing fantasy moves against the air that your teacher may or may not be able to explain.