Battle of the Combat Sports

Combat sports have always been compared between each other to find the ultimate fighting style. However, unlike the past where martial arts were not open to outsider communities, today they cross any racial and space boundaries. It is now easier to find and test talents.

Contrary to what many people might think, MMA is not a new sport. It originated from ancient Greece, and was one of the Olympic competitive disciplines. Over time, it has developed from a respected sport to a cruel and primitive form of fighting in the eyes of the public. Although today it is available to practice to any race, unlike the past where only ethnic Greeks could compete in it, this sport is still outlawed in many regions of the world.

Modern MMA is highly controversial not only for the general public, but among other sports as well. Mixed martial arts practitioners are known to question and challenge other competitors from different combat styles. This gave birth to a long lasting and bloody sports war. However, the beauty of this is that MMA allows this quarrel to be resolved practically, and not remain a theoretical dispute.

This is not an article about MMA. I discuss the most popular combat sports, comparing their advantages and disadvantages. I am not putting them against each other to resolve the theoretical dispute.

This is the sport those born prior to the mid 1990s wanted to be in. Yes, those were the years every little kid watched Karate Kid, Bloodsport and American Ninja. Everyone wanted to be Jean-Claude Vann Damme, Steven Seagal, and Bruce Lee. Spirituality of fighting was much more the centre of attention than being the MVP in a Las Vegas show.

Karate is a sport, not a single fight style. It is the umbrella name for many combat disciplines and karate Schools (as concepts). Needless to say, it originated in the East many centuries ago.

There are different styles of karate, teaching the participants spirituality, precision, endurance, strength, weapon handling, and arts. Not all sports compete in sparring; some are just for performance as a work of art.

Let us consider only those which test fighting. No matter the School, fight stances in karate are generally unstable. They do fine within the given sport, but are way too vulnerable to attacks. The guard is low and does not fully cover the head or the body. Legs are completely unprotected. Protection is performed by kicks and hand movements that push the strikes away. There are high chances that a strike is missed at a certain speed.

The reach of the hands is generally short compared to boxing where the body movement can extend it. Certain power generating punches are not present in most karate disciplines, like the hook, and the uppercut.

On the plus side, karate teaches spirituality, which is very essential to recovery and development of the full potential of the body and the mind. Fighting is not just a physical activity. High power of will, determination, endurance, and intellect, are needed to overcome everyday challenges and to outsmart the opponent.

Karate artists are known for their precision and speed, which are two of the basic points of scoring. We all have seen practitioners breaking piles of wooden, ice, and concrete blocks. This shows the power behind their punches, and the strength of their bodies. The problem is that the fighters fail to translate this sort of striking into the arena.

I am sure many of you have heard about these because of Fedor Emelianenko. Whereas Judo comes from Japan, Sambo is a Russian sport. They are a bit different in the rules they have, and yet appear to be very similar.

Judo has sparring and arts performance elements. The sparring part includes rolls, throws, hold-downs, chokes, locks and strikes, but the focus is on throwing and groundwork. Judo practitioners fight at a close range; and therefore, cannot get enough momentum for a strong punch. Because of the nature of the sport, the techniques of punching are not as developed as a those of a (kick)boxer.

It is Judo that inspired the creation of Sambo. Sambo includes several disciplines – sport, combat, and freestyle. It is the national sport of Russia, taught to army cadets and police officers. It is very close to Judo, except it pays more attention to striking. It would look more like kickboxing with throw-downs to the fresh eye. It is very rare, although not impossible, that a match finishes with a knock out.

Judo and Sambo are excellent combat styles if one is looking to learn how to fight. Spirituality is not essential here. Training regimes are relatively easy compared to other sports. The uniforms are like karate’s gi with a belt (obi), and protectors (hands, legs and head) in Sambo. All this makes them safer sports to practice with yet the same outcome as others – tactical fighting, good physique, and strong discipline.

This combat sport is a form of grappling. It completely omits striking. Although looking similar to Greco-roman wrestling, it is very different. A win is granted by points or submission; hence the reason as to why it is a cornerstone in MMA training.

This form of fighting is a little more exhausting than plain striking. Grappling requires more endurance and power to lift, push, pull, and hold, compared to throwing punches. Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu is particularly useful in street fights, since all of them end up on the ground (out of fear or lack of competences in striking from those involved). Since the nature of the sport does not tolerate striking, a BJJ practitioner is not a good fighter overall. Every punch you land will cause a big damage due to the fact that BJJ fighters have not been used to being hit anywhere. However, do not let this fool you. They can as well choke you out, rip off a joint, break bones and leave you paralyzed for the rest of your life.

Many people think there is just the WWE. Newsbreak, guys – that is not wrestling. It is a scripted form of entertainment called “professional wrestling.” The stunts professional wrestlers do are real; hence their injuries. However, it is not the sport people refer to when they say “wrestling.”

Greco-roman wrestling comes from the ancient times. The name of the sport ascertains its origins for you. To the general public, it might look like Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu, but it is not as close. The rules forbid one major BJJ technique – joint locks.

In Greco-roman wrestling a win is awarded by a fall, a technical superiority, a decision, a default (if the contestant is unable or refuses to continue), an injury, or disqualification.

Additionally, points are scored for take-downs, reversals (when the opponent takes control over the position), exposure (when the contestant’s back touches the mat for several seconds), penalty (when a contestant takes an injury time-out and is not bleeding), out-of-bounds (when a contestant sets foot out of the ring range).

The training regimens of wrestlers are very hard and heavy. Physically they are very strong people. The nature of fighting has made their bodies endurable. However, BJJ and Greco-roman practitioners would have the hardest time to transition to other combat sports than any other fighters from this article. They have no knowledge and awareness about stances and striking, which is vital for stand-up sports.

Boxing is such a fun and beautiful sport. It is the mother of all striking (excluding karate). It has been particularly compared to MMA. Maybe this is due to the extreme pride of competitors in both sports. On the one side, we have boxers who normally say they would knock out anyone coming close to their hands. On the other side, MMA artists say such an opportunity would not even occur, and that they would take their opponents down on the ground where their punching power becomes useless.

In MMA a good fighter has to obtain many skills from different combat sports, and be able to make them work together. A boxer has to focus just on his hands. That makes boxing much simpler and easy to pick up. Boxers have amazing punching power compared to the average MMA fighter. Boxers also fight more rounds than their MMA opponents. However, they do not have the elements of other combat sports which additionally drain the fighter.

It is somewhat contextual to ascertain which sport is safer. In boxing fighters aim their punches at their opponents’ heads and body for 6-12 rounds. This can cause great neurological damages.

Mixed martial artists rely on other tactics and body parts to score a win. Thus, a different danger occurs. Contestants can break bones, tear muscles and tendons, separate joints and still get knocked out the same way a boxer could. Bear in mind that even though some may say boxers have stronger punches, their gloves are also bigger. The reason we still see more retired boxers with speech impediments than MMA artists is because the former have smaller area to focus their amazing power on, while the latter have the whole body to exploit, and fewer competence in striking. That is the simple answer – MMA guys do not get hit as much as boxers.

Boxers cover their heads with their big gloves, instead of pushing the punches away like karate. This is a better protection system. The legs are not a targeted for punching, and therefore – protection. The body, however, still remains relatively exposed. People who think that a punch in the head has more impact on a fighter are wrong. It is the body that hurts the most when hit. Boxers protect their middle section by having a more diagonal stance, and pivoting their waists away from the punches while covering with the elbows at the same time.

Overall, if you want to be active in a combat sport and become reasonably educated on the subject for a short period of time, then get involved in boxing.

Kickboxing is a combination of kicking and boxing, as the name suggests. A competitor in this sport must have the same abilities as a boxer, and still be able to kick. That makes such a fighter a lethal weapon with a long range of striking. American kickboxing forbids the use of knees and elbows for safety reasons. However, an accurate kick to the head would still put anyone in “inception.”

Kickboxing is a gracious combat sport. Head concoctions are fewer than in boxing, but the ratio of broken bones is higher. Indeed, kickboxers have more parts of the body to focus on, and this is exactly why there is a higher risk of injuries.

The protection of kickboxers is the same as of boxers. They just have an additional element – legs. That makes them somewhat more dangerous and ultimate fighters. Kickboxers do not defend from leg-kicks by kicking away (like in some karate styles). They absorb the impact with the side part of the leg. Overall, the kickboxing defense system is more reliable than the one they use in karate.

This is the Thai version of kickboxing created for warfare purposes. It is a cruel form of fighting as it is allowed to hit the opponent with knees and elbows. Muay Thai fighters practice their strikes on banana palms, which harden their bones and make their body parts numb. A Muay Thai kickboxer is the most complete striker from this list. Students are taught to endure extreme pain and exhaustion.

Muay Thai has a wider range of strikes than American kickboxing, and a system for more powerful punches. The defense system remains the same.

True Muay Thai is not for everybody. Those fighters can be put against any combat sports competitors and still survive. Groundwork is their only weakness. Other than that, they have the whole formula for an ultimate fighter – speed, power, endurance, pain tolerance, and discipline.

There is a reason why the above combat styles are not as popular any more. Apart from money and fame potential, they are way too basic. They test the practitioners’ skills within their own sport. A more ambitious fighter would find this dull and not challenging enough. This is where K-1 and MMA come in.

Both sports are very different. If a fighter would like to test his stand-up skills, he would choose either boxing or K-1 (depending on whether he would want to use just hands or feet as well) as a field of realization. If the fighter wants to take it to the next level, he would prefer MMA.

K-1

K-1 is one of my favorite competitions. It is a world wide kickboxing organization which faces the best stand-up martial arts against each other. Thus, K-1 represents the ultimate arena for comparing striking skills. It first originated as Seidokaikan Karate Tournament in 1980. However, changes of the rules led to a change of the sport, which gave birth to K-1. Today the rules are closer to kickboxing, than karate.

Unlike MMA, K-1 is strictly a tournament sport. Preliminaries are organized in various countries as traditional tournaments where the winners qualify for the regional GP (Grand Prix).

After the regional GPs are complete, the winners are sent to the Final Elimination. This is a 16-men tournament where fighters compete for the Finals. The Final 16, as it is often called, is composed by six (6) GP winners, two (2) fighters selected by the K-1 organization, and the eight (8) finalists from the previous year. The match-ups in the Final 16 are then paired by drawing. The finalists from this stage are then sent to the next in the same fashion.

In 2010, K-1 was partnered with Fuji TV, becoming the first combat sports show in history to be filmed in 3D mode.

MMA

The ultimate combat sport would be one which puts under its umbrella not just one aspect of fighting, but all forms and methods of legal techniques. This is what Mixed Martial Arts is all about. This sport truly tests one’s overall fighting skills. It is this sense of self-confidence that leads mixed martial artists to challenge other combatants no matter what sport they practice.

Let us first consider one thing. MMA artists are generally more athletic. The sport, in general, is more demanding physically due to the wide range of skills the fighter must have. For example, a wrestler would have specific fitness regimen and skill training for his requirements, just like a kickboxer would have his own. An MMA artist would typically have to incorporate the regimes of the both of them. Just bear in mind this – each combat sports fighter trains through the whole day for his discipline alone. An MMA practitioner has to combine several disciplines in his regime. This is time consuming and physically, mentally, and emotionally exhausting.

In other words, what other fighters do, MMA artists do more. But, of course, there are some things that can help. Based on who they face in the ring, mixed martial artists can adjust their training. Thus, they can omit one fight style to focus on what their opponents miss.

Just because of that, I always say MMA artists are somewhat contextual fighters. They are athletic and competent, no doubt about that. But put them under a given set of rules and see how universal they are. I doubt that an MMA fighter would do better against a boxer under boxing rules (just like the opposite; but then again, who is arguing against that?). Just because they have to focus on so many techniques makes them good on all of them, but not perfect in any single of them. MMA fighters might, otherwise, beat any fighter’s style under MMA rules.

I know that many of you would give Alistair Overeem as an example for what I just said. He won the 2010 K-1 World GP, currently has the Strikeforce heavyweight belt, and is a major contender in MMA. I do not ignore talents like him. Such freaks of nature do exist. However, keep in mind that he knows much more about kickboxing than any other MMA fighter (and this is what helps him in both sports). He first started as a kickboxer and made his career in MMA when he was still young. This gives him a big advantage in both organizations (K-1 and MMA).

Overall, fighting over such theoretical disputes is stupid. A sport is a sport. If people continue with this, then why not compare boxing to tennis and see who the better opponent is. It just sounds retarded.

DISCLAIMER: This article does not have the intention to encourage violence. Physical activity is good for you as long as you do it in the form of sport, fitness, hobby, or entertainment. Do not resort to violence!