How Kickboxing Came To America
The origin of kickboxing can be found in Thailand as far back 2000 years ago, where the discipline of the Muay Thai fighting was practiced. The Muay Thai fighting was later developed into a national sport in Thailand and became a common and populous sport in Asia. The sport was regulated by the Thailand government through the world Muay Thai council.
Kickboxing came about from the combination of the Muay Thai fighting and martial art; it was first created and promoted in 1950 by the karate specialist Tasuo Yamada and Japanese boxer Osamu Noguchi.
The origin of kick boxing in America can be traced to 1970 when American karate practitioners became frustrated with the stringent rules of the then martial art as it didn’t involve kicks and punches. The idea of having a sport that allows kicks and punches gave rise to kickboxing. Events were slated and bouts were fought. The sport gradually began attracting interest.
At the initial stage most fighters had to learn how the sport is played through a process of trial and error. The fighters noticed that they are not fully fit as they could hardly complete the rounds when they organized professional fights, and this was largely due to their martial art background. Martial arts students are taught to pull back their punches and kicks.
And in other to improve the sport, they adopted the fighting techniques of western professional boxing. They had to continue training and fighting several bouts in other to get acquainted with these techniques. The training increased their stamina, toughened their bodies and strengthened their mind.
Some fighters also hit the boxing gym to learn these boxing strategies. They were trained alongside boxers by professional boxer trainers. They hit heavy bags to develop their punching power.
New kickboxing training techniques and strategies were created and adopted into the sport. All these led to a remarkable growth in the sport, the fighters became fit and kickboxing bouts became very excited and action packed. Subsequently More techniques were introduced, new fighters emerged and stars like Bill Wallace, Joe Lewis, Benny Urquides and many more were made.
The American kick boxers wanted to test themselves against others around the world, so they sent teams of kick boxers to Japan under the world kickboxing association. This was the beginning of kickboxing as an international sport in the US and it continued to thrive.
Other world kickboxing sanctioning bodies have since been enacted in the US. Like the International Sport Karate Association (ISKA), The World Karate Association (WKA), The Professional Karate Commission (PKC), The World Association of Kickboxing (WAK) Organizations and many more. The world kick boxing federation was also formed in England.
With the formation of these bodies, several rules and regulations were introduced into the sport. There are also so many tournaments and titles to fight for, numerous promoters came on board, discovering new fighters and exposing the sport.
The sport had since grown to become one of the most popular and is now one of the major sport and martial art discipline.
One major proponent that led to the development of kickboxing is Bruce Lee, he also contributed to the popularity of the sport in the US.
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