The 1963 Fight That Started Kickboxing - When Karate Lost to Muay Thai

[Kevin von Duuglas-Ittu]

1 minute ago, AndyMaBobs said:

I can understand the Thai's feeling that the Japanese stole their art but it's not really true.

The problem was a particular, historical problem. I'm sure there is no contemporary Thai who thinks about Japanese Kickboxing as anything at all. The tensions around the 1982 World Championships were apparently VERY high. The Japanese didn't steal techniques, they copied the commercial product of fighting, put on 3 weekly televised kickboxing shows, made huge iconic stars (probably through lots of fixed fights), and then tried to bring it over to Thailand. That, apparently was the problem. As to taking the "Thai kick" or the whatever, Thais wouldn't care less. Maybe on the forums and conversation spaces you visit this is a big deal - because westerners are all about authentic technique, etc, because gyms commercially sell themselves as holding authentic technique - but Thais couldn't care less. There is so much variety of technique in Thailand it isn't even funny. 

[AndyMaBobs]

41 minutes ago, Kevin von Duuglas-Ittu said:

This is much in debate. Several sources I've read said the opposite, that Oyama was the master marketer. If you read up on Oyama's bio and claims for himself you run into some pretty spectacular marketing stories. I'm also not sure how you would assess his Karate, as he was Oyama's top-ish student by many accounts (though they had a falling out). If he wasn't teaching kyokushin I'd be very surprised. It serves people advocating for Karate's legacy to minimize his skill, but I imagine that really was not the case.

I asked my friend on this point because he knows more about it than I do. He said that Kurosaki wasn't Oyama's student, they both trained Goju Ryu together. They founded KK together. They had big differences on where they thought karate should go from there, Oyama was a big believer of knockdown rules karate, in his opinion it was more realistic to keep karate bare knuckle and restrict punching to the face - Kurosaki basically wanted kickboxing. 

Kyokushin competition as itself now is huge, Holland, Japan and Brazil are the big three as far as that's concerned and those fights are brutal. Oyama himself was a lot of hype and marketing (not that he was PURELY that) but fighters that he trained definitely live up to those ideas. Those dudes can walk through anything, their conditioning is that tough.

[Kevin von Duuglas-Ittu]

11 minutes ago, AndyMaBobs said:

Kyokushin competition as itself now is huge, Holland, Japan and Brazil are the big three as far as that's concerned and those fights are brutal.

Soooo. The kickboxing talent pool is incredibly weak, you say. But the Kyokushin talent pool is amazing. I sense, well, someone who loves Kyokushin, hahaha. No matter this isn't going to reach agreement. I personally am really interested in the heritage and changes of martial arts, but honestly listening to Karate people tug of war over who was an authentic teacher, and who was the fraud is incredible boring. You never get any of this in Muay Thai, why? Because the quality of the Muay Thai is shown in actual, high level fights, fights that become incredibly famous. In actual fighters. It would be like arguing about the greatest baseball players the history of Baseball in America, but then there was an totally different version of the sport in, let's say, Norway, where it was customary to argue about who was the best TEACHER of alter-baseball, and not actual Norwegenian alter-baseball games, actual alter-baseball players. When you say: Wow, Karuhat was as good any fighter Thailand has every produced, you never get "But who was his master? Where did he get his "fight style" from?! What school is he? All these questions really point to nonsense for me. You know where Karuhat got his fighting style when you ask him? He made it up. He made it up because he was forced as a kid to spar and play with lots of other high level fighters, and he was pushed through a beautiful and difficult regime. And he made it up because he had to beat the very best fighters who ever walked, in real fights, with lots of money on the line. Please give me a fighting art that has no "masters", as the definition of its authenticity.

[AndyMaBobs]

4 minutes ago, Kevin von Duuglas-Ittu said:

Soooo. The kickboxing talent pool is incredibly weak, you say. But the Kyokushin talent pool is amazing. I sense, well, someone who loves Kyokushin, hahaha. No matter this isn't going to reach agreement. I personally am really interested in the heritage and changes of martial arts, but honestly listening to Karate people tug of war over who was an authentic teacher, and who was the fraud is incredible boring. You never get any of this in Muay Thai, why? Because the quality of the Muay Thai is shown in actual, high level fights, fights that become incredibly famous. In actual fighters. It would be like arguing about the greatest baseball players the history of Baseball in America, but then there was an totally different version of the sport in, let's say, Norway, where it was customary to argue about who was the best TEACHER of alter-baseball, and not actual Norwegenian alter-baseball games, actual alter-baseball players. When you say: Wow, Karuhat was as good any fighter Thailand has every produced, you never get "But who was his master? Where did he get his "fight style" from?! What school is he? All these questions really point to nonsense for me. You know where Karuhat got his fighting style when you ask him? He made it up. He made it up because he was forced as a kid to spar and play with lots of other high level fighters, and he was pushed through a beautiful and difficult regime. And he made it up because he had to beat the very best fighters who ever walked, in real fights, with lots of money on the line. Please give me a fighting art that has no "masters", as the definition of its authenticity.

 

Yeah there is a lot more competition in kyokushin than kickboxing, I think it's the appeal of karate to kids and parents - and because of knockdown also drawing peopel from kyokushins offshoot styles. Although I wouldn't say we need to reach agreement, because I'm not really disagreeing with you

[AndyMaBobs]

From what google-fu I've done (I haven't dug into blackbelt or anything like that) Huafai Lukcontai was indeed a Thai and lost his fight to the Japanese fighter. I haven't found anything on the other guy yet.

So at least two of the three muay thai fighters were Thai, 1 with a win, 1 with a loss. Both fights looking pretty similar of getting thrown about the ring, the main difference being that Huafai was not able to properly adjust.

[Kevin von Duuglas-Ittu]

On 6/25/2019 at 10:54 PM, AndyMaBobs said:

From what google-fu I've done (I haven't dug into blackbelt or anything like that) Huafai Lukcontai was indeed a Thai and lost his fight to the Japanese fighter. I haven't found anything on the other guy yet.

We may not be referring to the same set of early fights. Honestly, it was a year ago I read up on this. To me it's not even worth thinking about. Japanese fighting at the time was laughably (seriously, humorously) inferior. (The other day we asked Dieselnoi about the World Championship fights he fought in in 1982 in which the Japanese kickboxers (and all the other kickboxers in the world) were overwhelmed, and he just started giggling. He said, "you have to understand, it was all yodmuay. All the fights went very fast." But he really was giggling like a child. He pointed to his knee where he still has a scar from the tooth of a Korean fighter. And this is 20 years after these original bouts.)  At the time we are thinking about these are very likely the best Japanese fighters in the country, or at least in the upper percentile. They are not fighting elite Thais. Putting these guys against the best fighters in Thailand at the time, in lots of fights, would have been an endless embarrassment - again, not because Japanese Karate sucks, it's because of the very deep experience in actual fights top Thais had, and the fact that Karate really was not a full contact fighting sport.

[Jeremy Stewart]

2 hours ago, Kevin von Duuglas-Ittu said:

We may not be referring to the same set of early fights. Honestly, it was a year ago I read up on this. To me it's not even worth thinking about. Japanese fighting at the time was laughably (seriously, humorously) inferior. (The other day we asked Dieselnoi about the World Championship fights he fought in in 1982 in which the Japanese kickboxers (and all the other kickboxers in the world) were overwhelmed, and he just started giggling. He said, "you have to understand, it was all yodmuay. All the fights went very fast." But he really was giggling like a child. He pointed to his knee where he still has a scar from the tooth of a Korean fighter. And this is 20 years after these original bouts.)  At the time we are thinking about these are very likely the best Japanese fighters in the country, or at least in the upper percentile. They are not fighting elite Thais. Putting these guys against the best fighters in Thailand at the time, in lots of fights, would have been an endless embarrassment - again, not because Japanese Karate sucks, it's because of the very deep experience in actual fights top Thais had, and the fact that Karate really was not a full contact fighting sport.

This may be the one you're talking about. With regards to Dieselnoi.

Edited June 29, 2019 by Jeremy Stewart

[AndyMaBobs]

23 hours ago, Kevin von Duuglas-Ittu said:

We may not be referring to the same set of early fights. Honestly, it was a year ago I read up on this. To me it's not even worth thinking about. Japanese fighting at the time was laughably (seriously, humorously) inferior. (The other day we asked Dieselnoi about the World Championship fights he fought in in 1982 in which the Japanese kickboxers (and all the other kickboxers in the world) were overwhelmed, and he just started giggling. He said, "you have to understand, it was all yodmuay. All the fights went very fast." But he really was giggling like a child. He pointed to his knee where he still has a scar from the tooth of a Korean fighter. And this is 20 years after these original bouts.)  At the time we are thinking about these are very likely the best Japanese fighters in the country, or at least in the upper percentile. They are not fighting elite Thais. Putting these guys against the best fighters in Thailand at the time, in lots of fights, would have been an endless embarrassment - again, not because Japanese Karate sucks, it's because of the very deep experience in actual fights top Thais had, and the fact that Karate really was not a full contact fighting sport.

It looks like it was the same set, February 12th 1964, Huafai Lucontai (Thai) lost to Fujihara, Rawee Dechachai (Thai) beat Kurosaki, Tan Charan lost to Nakamura. Tan is the fighter I can't find much on, the closest bit of information I've found today was on a forum that said that Tan Charan was Chinese by heritage, but was born and grew up in Thailand - so presumably in the same boxing camp system.

So from best I can gather, 2 of the fighters were Thai, ethnically, but all 3 muay thai fighters were Thai by nationality and I'd be surprised if they weren't all trained through the Thai 'system' of making fighters. You're likely right that these were the best kyokushin fighters, ironically except for the karateka that lost (and in fairness most of the fight is him throwing Rawee around). It's hard to know a lot of this concretely though, how good any of these fighters were, Japanese or Thai, most of the information I've come by is people also talking about this like we are now. I've seen clips of Rawee that were not related to these fights - and from what I gather he was respected at the time, but as to what the actual scene for Muay Thai was like in the 1960s - I don't really know. 

[AndyMaBobs]

21 hours ago, Jeremy Stewart said:

This may be the one you're talking about. With regards to Dieselnoi.

Man I love Dieselnoi. There's something about the very awkward way he switch kicks that gives me a smile. I hope I get to train with him, and hopefully not get knee'd one day!

[Jeremy Stewart]

19 minutes ago, AndyMaBobs said:

Man I love Dieselnoi. There's something about the very awkward way he switch kicks that gives me a smile. I hope I get to train with him, and hopefully not get knee'd one day!

I reckon he's the best. I watch him and I get the shivers.

[AndyMaBobs]

1 hour ago, Jeremy Stewart said:

I reckon he's the best. I watch him and I get the shivers.

I think of the fights I've been able to find of the golden age guys, he might be my favourite. I love Sagat too.

[Kevin von Duuglas-Ittu]

3 hours ago, AndyMaBobs said:

I hope I get to train with him, and hopefully not get knee'd one day!

Chances of training with him are pretty limited, generally. But he'll be at Sylvie's gym Petchrungruang from probably July 2019 til January 2020. I urge pretty much anyone who has a passion for him to make the trip out to Pattaya. It's very rare.

[Kevin von Duuglas-Ittu]

4 hours ago, AndyMaBobs said:

It looks like it was the same set, February 12th 1964, Huafai Lucontai (Thai) lost to Fujihara, Rawee Dechachai (Thai) beat Kurosaki, Tan Charan lost to Nakamura.

This was the Black Belt magazine source I had in mind.

Note, the described animosity between Thai and Japanese and the Japanese desire to prove the efficacy of Karate. I assumed in reading this that "an Islamic" and "the Chinese" and "the Chinaman" were striking descriptions - I had assumed this emphasis meant that there were not Thais, or at the very least not those that Thailand would choose to defend Muay Thai's honor internationally if this was a substantive event. The author points out that these match ups came after a bit of "searching". Even if the author is only making racialist observations, because this match supposedly was a "Thailand" vs "Japan" match, it seems pretty notable that 2 of the fighters were not ethnically "Thai" (probably a pretty big deal in 1963, and read as non-Thai at least at some social level). The writer is making the distinction boldly. But perhaps they were Thai nationals. But, the article makes the assertion that these were admittedly not particularly strong Thai Muay Thai fighters.

Osamu Noguchi, if I recall, is the Japanese promoter who was reportedly run out of town (Bangkok, abandoning his kickboxing gym) after the 1982 World Championships still attempting to assert the worthiness of Japanese fighters vs Thais two decades years later. It appeared to be an enduring preoccupation.

[Jeremy Stewart]

23 hours ago, AndyMaBobs said:

I think of the fights I've been able to find of the golden age guys, he might be my favourite. I love Sagat too.

Wangchannoi Sor Palangchai is my favourite. 

[AndyMaBobs]

On 6/30/2019 at 1:36 PM, Kevin von Duuglas-Ittu said:

This was the Black Belt magazine source I had in mind.

Note, the described animosity between Thai and Japanese and the Japanese desire to prove the efficacy of Karate. I assumed in reading this that "an Islamic" and "the Chinese" and "the Chinaman" were striking descriptions - I had assumed this emphasis meant that there were not Thais, or at the very least not those that Thailand would choose to defend Muay Thai's honor internationally if this was a substantive event. The author points out that these match ups came after a bit of "searching". Even if the author is only making racialist observations, because this match supposedly was a "Thailand" vs "Japan" match, it seems pretty notable that 2 of the fighters were not ethnically "Thai" (probably a pretty big deal in 1963, and read as non-Thai at least at some social level). The writer is making the distinction boldly. But perhaps they were Thai nationals. But, the article makes the assertion that these were admittedly not particularly strong Thai Muay Thai fighters.

Osamu Noguchi, if I recall, is the Japanese promoter who was reportedly run out of town (Bangkok, abandoning his kickboxing gym) after the 1982 World Championships still attempting to assert the worthiness of Japanese fighters vs Thais two decades years later. It appeared to be an enduring preoccupation.

The sense I get form the names at least is that Huafai was certainly ethnically Thai - sounds like a Thai muslim name, although we know that Charan isn't.  I think either way though it looks to me that they were at the very least trained through the Thai system. I'd be interested if any footage of Charan's fight comes out, because most of the two fights from that event that we have are the muay thai fighters getting ragdolled. I figure it's the same as far as Charan goes, the lack of real defense to throws was a big problem for these guys.

The sense that I get from the article is that it tries to distance the two that lost from the one that won or at the least tries to separate them as not being truly Thai, at least on like you said a social level. It reads to me like Huafai and Charan were thrown under the bus for losing, or at least that's my reading of it.

[Kevin von Duuglas-Ittu]

4 hours ago, AndyMaBobs said:

The sense I get form the names at least is that Huafai was certainly ethnically Thai - sounds like a Thai muslim name, although we know that Charan isn't.  I think either way though it looks to me that they were at the very least trained through the Thai system. I'd be interested if any footage of Charan's fight comes out, because most of the two fights from that event that we have are the muay thai fighters getting ragdolled. I figure it's the same as far as Charan goes, the lack of real defense to throws was a big problem for these guys.

The sense that I get from the article is that it tries to distance the two that lost from the one that won or at the least tries to separate them as not being truly Thai, at least on like you said a social level. It reads to me like Huafai and Charan were thrown under the bus for losing, or at least that's my reading of it.

Or, simply that Noguchi who would have a long career creating some pretty suspicious fights (check out Fujiwaras 99 KOs), making his audience primed for the coming new smash sensation kickboxing, just had two show fights for PR reasons, and this was the most diplomatic way of describing those fights. The article is written as a celebration of Kickboxing, not Muay Thai, this is Black Belt magazine. The account of 1963 is a story telling how great Japanese Kickboxing had become. Clearly the author understood the event to be a PR event to make Japanese audiences satisfied. I strongly suspect that it was hardly a blip in Thailand rather than it being some kind of terible stigma (wow, we are getting so creative!).. Noguchi went and found some guys, hey ANY guys, who would come to Japan and fight some Karate dudes, and 2 of the three were not even (likely) ethnically Thai, admitted to be not very strong.

Just as a note though, there really is no such thing as a 'Thai System", unless you just mean: hit a bag a bunch and had some fights. There really is no standard of a system at all. There was an incredibly broad range of talent and skill fighting in Thailand at that time. An unskilled fighter could easily find themselves fighting at Lumpinee then from what I have heard from fighters of that era. 

 

[AndyMaBobs]

Thai system as in the twice a day, six day a week rota that most gyms operate off of. Not as in everyone learning muay thai in the same way or with the same mechanics

[AndyMaBobs]

I gave the article a proper read and I do have a few issues with it just factually a source. The fact that it gets the year of the fight wrong really bothers me, it was not 1963, it was 1964 as Tadashi Nakamura said in his autobiography (I trust him on the date, he was there after all!). There are obvious things about the article and this thread that I wouldn't dispute at all Sawamura's laughable fixed fights, Japanese kickboxing complete with elbows seemingly like they swiped Muay Thai and put it under a different name. All that stuff 100%.

But there are some errors in the article which are normal for black belt magazine, that make me not like it as a primary source. Not that there is much available as far as information goes. But the bottom line is that in 63 Thailand issues the challenge (before Kyokushin was founded), the event gets rescheduled several times, they fought in '64. Muay Thai lost 2 of the 3 bouts, and Nakamura bitched about an unfair stoppage to elbows because in his mind him winning for most of the fight means it must be favouritism and not a come from behind victory (dumb). From all I can find on the fighters, all three were born raised and trained in Thailand, one is a Chinese immigrant. 

We could discuss whether or not they were 'ethnically' Thai all day but that's really neither here nor there. The issue isn't that were they ethnically the Thai, the issue is that they didn't know how to defend throws and it seems that at least two of those guys (I believe Huafai and Rawee) were coming out of retirement to do it. 

It's a rivalry that martial arts fans created in their minds, really this event regardless of the fights outcomes themselves just developed martial arts more and as you say, kick started kickboxing. I think saying anything more beyond that by this point in the talk is really going round in circles haha. It seems like we do agree for the most part - there's just details that I don't think are accurate, and from the magazine that bolstered Frank Dux and Ashida Kim, I can't expect them to get everything 100%

[JoopSnoop]

On 6/25/2019 at 6:20 PM, Kevin von Duuglas-Ittu said:

”Not really worth mentioning - I mean you can mention it, but you would also have to mention that they "Muay Thai fighters" that they beat were not Thais” What are you saying? The Thais challenged the Japanese, the Japanese beat them 2-1 and now all you can say is, 'Oh they weren't actually Thai.' What were they? Why would the Thais put non-Thais in against a team from Japan in Thailand to accept their challenge? That's just really dumb. It doesn't even make sense! That is like saying Ernesto Hoost and Ivan Hippolyte aren't Dutch because they are ethnic so if they lost a fight it was the enthicity's fault. That's very naive.

And it was Thai rules in Thailand with gloves. When the Thais accepted invites to fight in Japan with Kyokushin rules in the 1975 world tournament they lost. Soundly.

Four Kyokushin fighters were chosen. Oyama chose Kurosaki as the coach and asked him to prepare the fighters. He was the only coach of the team. The Thais kept changing the date. Three changes I believe. The changes may have been legitimate. It doesn't matter. In the end two of the fighters couldn't come. So Kurosaki HAD to step in. He was 35 years old, and Dechachai was at his peak. Kurosaki was training the team, not training as part of the tea. How many fight coaches have you ever known to step in and accept a fight when their fighter was out? Never happens. He was completely unready but stepped up anyway. Like most coaches he had fight experience of course, but definitely not at a point where he puts on gloves and gets in a ring for the first time.

Kurosaki didn't co-create Kyokushin. In 1953 when you suggest he help co-create Kyokushin he was a 23 year old student. He was about 20 when he started training with Oyama. He was just one of a group of students.

"You have a Karate Master, a man who helped create and disseminate Kyokushin", no, not accurate at all. He helped disseminate kyokushin AFTER the fight in Thailand at the request of his teacher Oyama. 

 

Edited July 21, 2020 by JoopSnoop
changes

[AndyMaBobs]

19 hours ago, JoopSnoop said:

 

You've accidentally put your entire response into a quote.

I did a fact check on this though a few months ago, and contacted Takasan the kickboxing/muay thai historian in Japan, he wrote a couple books on these early days of kickboxing but they haven't been translated into English. It was a pain in the ass because on top of a language barrier he is also quite eccentric, but worth it as he cleared up a few areas for me as he had other sources to draw upon. Yes, it is false that only one of the fighters was Thai. Tan Charan was ethnically Chinese, but Thai, and Huafai was Thai.  Black Belt Magazine also got the year in question wrong, it was 1964, though it was originally planned for 63, that's probably where the mistake comes from, and like I mentioned before, Black Belt Magazine was a joke of a publication that would put up actual frauds, so they weren't going to have an editor fact checking, they would take it at face value.

There is one correction I will make though JoopSnoop, Kurosaki stepping in at the last minute, was a misconception based on what the historian told me. He said this wasn't actually true (I made this mistake myself on this very thread), he'd been reported as training for it in advance, it seems he always intended to fight. Perhaps he was a replacement, at last minute, but he was keeping in shape just in case at the very least. That and the rules were modified to allow for more use of throws, this was requested by the Japanese fighters so they could use more of their weapons + is a very Japanese move. 

No he wasn't co-creator of kyokushin at all, but he was very good at marketing it and working with Mas Oyama to spread it around, so I don't think its unfair to call him a founding father so to speak.  He eventually splintered off because he didn't really like the knockdown rules.

Here are some photos Takasan sent me from the event, at the moment all sources of these pictures online come from him.I'm trying to keep a dialogue with him the best I can to find out what else we can uncover about these early days. Hopefully he won't be upset with me sharing:

 

Hope this is helpful to you JoopSnoop!

 

[JoopSnoop]

46 minutes ago, AndyMaBobs said:

Hope this is helpful to you JoopSnoop!

   ------------------------------------------------------------

Thank you, yes, Helpful.

Sorry I don't know how to do the quote thing right. Maybe I am using a bad browser

I mostly agree but still have good reason to say Kurosaki was not meant to fight. I was In Japan in 2006 and was able to visit Fujihira San, one of the three fighters. He has a small restaurant so we went for dinner. To cut the story shorter he said that Kurosaki was not meant to fight and was not ready to fight but had to because his sensei, Oyama, almost ordered him to. There were four fighters at first so they would have one fighter extra in case of injury. Two of them Okada and Oyama (not that Oyama) couldn't make it because of the date changes. Oyama was doing his legal studies at college and had examinations and Okada could no longer get time off his job. Fujihira said they were training together for more than a month and the date changed. Kurosaki was training them and making the plans and making the training ideas to help them get ready for the Thais because none of them had ever fought with gloves or in a ring at all. So he was about the same fitness as any trainer but they were all super fit not him. 

If you say that he was as fit as a karate guy training hard is then okay, he was ready enough but definately not ready for a fight against the thai. He did get in the ring so he wasn't unfit. But Fujihira laughed when he was talking about how Kurosaki reacted after the fight. He was angry he lost and hated they took him off in a tanker but he said next time he had better train with them! He was not ready at all to fight in the ring. Anyway, that is my story of meeting Fujihira at his small ramen restaurant.  

Also there are a few photos in Japanese magazines of him training with them. When they did the karate stuff in karate suits he trained with them, but when they did the kickboxing and glove training he was watching and teaching them. So he didn't do any of the hard training.

[AndyMaBobs]

17 minutes ago, JoopSnoop said:

1 hour ago, AndyMaBobs said:

Hope this is helpful to you JoopSnoop!

   ------------------------------------------------------------

Thank you, yes, Helpful.

Sorry I don't know how to do the quote thing right. Maybe I am using a bad browser

I mostly agree but still have good reason to say Kurosaki was not meant to fight. I was In Japan in 2006 and was able to visit Fujihira San, one of the three fighters. He has a small restaurant so we went for dinner. To cut the story shorter he said that Kurosaki was not meant to fight and was not ready to fight but had to because his sensei, Oyama, almost ordered him to. There were four fighters at first so they would have one fighter extra in case of injury. Two of them Okada and Oyama (not that Oyama) couldn't make it because of the date changes. Oyama was doing his legal studies at college and had examinations and Okada could no longer get time off his job. Fujihira said they were training together for more than a month and the date changed. Kurosaki was training them and making the plans and making the training ideas to help them get ready for the Thais because none of them had ever fought with gloves or in a ring at all. So he was about the same fitness as any trainer but they were all super fit not him. 

If you say that he was as fit as a karate guy training hard is then okay, he was ready enough but definately not ready for a fight against the thai. He did get in the ring so he wasn't unfit. But Fujihira laughed when he was talking about how Kurosaki reacted after the fight. He was angry he lost and hated they took him off in a tanker but he said next time he had better train with them! He was not ready at all to fight in the ring. Anyway, that is my story of meeting Fujihira at his small ramen restaurant.  

Also there are a few photos in Japanese magazines of him training with them. When they did the karate stuff in karate suits he trained with them, but when they did the kickboxing and glove training he was watching and teaching them. So he didn't do any of the hard training.

So from what I've heard, the event getting rescheduled from 1963 to 1964 caused visa problems for one of the fighters, which is why Kurosaki stepped in. I got that info from a different source, the two contradict each other so I don't know which is true! Happy to be wrong on that point though if he in fact wasn't meant to fight! It could be a semantic issue, in that someone can say 'he wasn't meant to fight' when he was the only one to lose, and that would imply that it's because he wasn't meant to fight at all, when he had been booked to fight since around December of 63 (based on my source)

I also could be over-complimenting Kurosaki in saying he's a bit of a founding father, because that does imply he helped found it, but what I more mean is that he is important to Kyokushin becoming wide spread - but yes you're quite correct not a founder. 

I should say that I'm a Muay Thai coach, not a kyokushin guy, I'm just quite close to the art of kyokushin due to having a lot of friends/acquaintances involved in the art! So I'm not fully on the 'inside' as it were 

Edited July 22, 2020 by AndyMaBobs

[JoopSnoop]

Thanks again. Never heard the visa thing but maybe that is why Okada couldn't go. But that might just be an excuse too. Also it was mean to be in October 1963 then it was changed to December then changed again to January 1964. At least Oyama could still fight in December but when it was changed again to another month after he couldn’t go and that is when Kurosaki was asked to fight instead. 

I am more a fan now. I did train until 2002 in kickboxing and had so many friend in Kyokushin because here in Netherlands the connection between kyokushin and kickboxing is old and strong. Where do you coach Muay Thai?

[AndyMaBobs]

1 minute ago, JoopSnoop said:

Thanks again. Never heard the visa thing but maybe that is why Okada couldn't go. But that might just be an excuse too. Also it was mean to be in October 1963 then it was changed to December then changed again to January 1964. At least Oyama could still fight in December but when it was changed again to another month after he couldn’t go and that is when Kurosaki was asked to fight instead. 

I am more a fan now. I did train until 2002 in kickboxing and had so many friend in Kyokushin because here in Netherlands the connection between kyokushin and kickboxing is old and strong. Where do you coach Muay Thai?

I coach in Britain in a gym out of East London, was taught by a golden age Thai fighter. I can DM you more details if you want!