Thread: muay thai or kyokushin?

I have no idea what Kyokushin is, but pick it only because it sounds so badass.

It depends on what you're looking for.

If you're looking for practicality, in that you want a hardcore style that is going to really teach you how to be most effective in a real fighting situation, and probably help you develop the most power throughout your full body, I would suggest muay thai.

If you want something that's a little more visual, that is powerful yet not quite as efficient, and a little more technical (which can both be a good and bad thing), as well as being more versatile, in that you will probably learn a few locks and grappling techniques that you won't learn in muay thai, I'd say go for kyokushin.

I'm not expert on the specifics on kyokushin, but I'm pretty familiar with karate (which it's a form of), so take my opinion with a grain of salt.

Kyokushin is a style of karate, I'm a third degree black belt of Shorin Ryu and if it's similar to that then I'd recommend the karate one. It's full of powerful kicks and effective joint locks.

Muay Thai is better if you want to fight in MMA tournaments, but it's not as effective in real world self defense because there is a lot of high kicking, which puts you off balance. They usually spar with gloves too, which through off blocking.

I've been in enough MMA tournaments to know that the Muay Thai guys (like the boxers) throw blocks that would work if we were both wearing gloves only to have my hands go right through them.

If you do Muay Thai, make sure that you pick a school that practices good conditioning. Deadening nerves so that you don't feel the blocks is dumb, learning how to TEMPORARILY block the pain, is the way to do proper conditioning. Kicking trees sends shockwaves into your knees and you'll end up like the Muay Thai guys who can't move their legs because of arthritis.

Judo is also inefficient for real world self defense because you don't want to take an opponent to the ground if you don't know their lethality status. Always assume that an attacker is armed or has friends around to kick you when you're down. Use your judo to avoid being taken down and get back up if you do. Karate teaches grappling too, so that's another reason why I'd recommend it.

I suggest not to chose a style, chose a school. Avoid the McDojos (thanks O for the term ) and try to find the ones with the best reputations, stop by for a practise session and see if it suits you.

Yeah, I did kenpo for a little bit (lets just say that it wasn't my thing), but always wanted to do some form of flashy karate.

But, regardless of what you want to do, be sure (as stated) to pick a highly respected school. Some "schools" can be really messed up in their conditioning, as ninja stated.