The Kickboxing Progress Over the Years

Kickboxing generally applies to what it name implies, its boxing, yet it utilizes kicks. While boxing would be regarded by many as a sport relying mainly on the hands and stances, other factors, kickboxing adds a whole new dimension, the feet. Like boxing though, kickboxing today is regarded as a sport or as a fitness regimen. Kickboxing in fact can be factored in to a number of sports, for one, the most popular today is MMA, or Mixed Martial Arts, but still, it can still be relegated to its basic form, both in Japanese and American Kickboxing. The term itself can be attributed to a Japanese boxing promoter, Osamu Noguchi.

Many experts would concur that kickboxing would find its roots in Japan. Early development in Japanese culture would show that it drew inspiration from a number of martial art form, namely, Muay Thai, which originated in Thailand. It is said that Osamu Noguchi developed kickboxing to create a movement to counter the mentioned Thailand martial art. Ina successful moment, the Japanese promoter held a competition years after with his students and Muay Thai fighters and won on a deciding 2-1 victory. In the beginning, to distinguish it from its mother form, kickboxing allowed the use of butting and throwing but was soon discouraged to achieve a purer form. This was in 1966.

A few years later, due to its growing popularity, a kickboxing association was founded in Japan to regulate the games it spawned. It even developed a kickboxing idol by the name of Tadashi Sawamura. Sadly, its popularity waned and when Tadashi subsequently retired, so did the clamor for the sport. It TV spots were dropped, and people lost interest. Until in 1993, when a new form of kickboxing competition, under the name K-1 came into the airwaves. Kickboxing once again enjoyed the public desire were kickboxers forged into the foray of a new martial arts genre, well, relatively new then, and soon gained ground in Europe and eventually North America. 

But even the renewed fame brought upon by K-1 in the early nineties, kickboxing was already being practiced in Europe. Jan Plas, a Dutch native, who learned kickboxing in Japan, introduced the sport in Netherlands in 1978 and even eventually founded the first kickboxing organization in Netherlands, the Dutch Kickboxing Association. 

Kickboxing, more than just a form of self defense and discipline is being enjoyed today not just for its benefits in dire situations, it is also popular for its capability to provide practitioners the means to develop their body and their mind as well. Many kickboxing classes are being held today and most of these students are there to exercise more than wishing to master the martial art for fighting purposes. Of these classes, studies show that almost sixty percent who enroll are women. Their main reason is to lose weight and to get body definition and strength. Secondary only is the purpose to develop their self defense skills.

It is seldom that you will see that kickboxing classes are not full. Unlike what yu see in the movies, kickboxing classes are now full of fun and less mystical. They exercise to the beat of modern music and are more flexible. 
