How would you convince somone to train Karate over..

[Himokiri Karate]

I see what you're getting at now. I do not have much experience with boxing gyms, though we did have a boxing coach at the MMA gym we ended up renting out who, when he had off time, would come over and teach us some stuff. It was a lot fun and informs a lot about the way that I fight now.

What I can speak towards is the idea that, broadly and with exceptions, traditional martial arts does tend to have the ability to focus on the individuals with more than others. I hypothesize her that this is largely due to the difference in competitive scenes of Boxing and Martial Arts. Boxing is far more popular than even something like MMA. The top 5 grossing PPV fights for boxing averaged 3,106,000 PPV buys whereas the top 5 UFC averaged 1,710,000 PPV. While MMA is not something like Karate, it is closer, and remains a good, if rough and imperfect, comparison. The point being, if a boxing coach has a person they're training who seems more than good, that they have whatever it factor that indicates that they can go the distance, then it also means that the coach could achieve renown. Renown means more requests to train people. It means larger cuts of prize money. It means that they're set for life and those students who are "merely talented" they few as fodder for the betterment of their prized students. Or perhaps they see someone who can be a coach one day and they keep them around to teach them that. Again, I have little to no familiarity with how boxing gyms work as a whole, so I'm basing this hypothetical off of your analysis and boxing movies.

Karate, on the other hand, does not have a clear path (though extremely difficult, requiring an absurd amount of dedication, and even then, often luck-based) to fame and fortune. No competitor gets rich off of their success at World's, or similar events. While fans of fighting, and I would wager and good number of non-fight fans, know who Floyd Mayweather is, and to a lesser extent Connor McGregor, I imagine that most would be hard pressed to tell you a single name of someone competing in KarateCombat. Even dojos that do focus heavily on tournament results and are successful won't really find the success that Boxing would. Because of that, and because it is better to have a high density of people who are placing at tournaments over than one person, Karate has more time to focus on more people than Boxing does, which may only ever see one person in a gym who could "go the distance" and that's if they're lucky.

Great post!

Excellent perspective in respect to how the trainers see the world. What you mentioned is fair because a boxing trainer also has to make ends meet and they too as well wish to live the good life with being financially set and having their legacy secured in terms of their contribution towards a sport they love and have dedicated themselves to be a part of.

Up to this point, I have no problem and so many trainers are like this that I decided to come up with my own boxing techniques through Korean Karate or karate/TKD. Then I came to a realization that, a trainer regardless of a style is also a mentor, teacher, psychologist and a confidant. In my Ki training, George Dillman was mentioned. But at one point, he trained Muhammad Ali. Its not like he taught him some crazy moves, but rather he was probably a good level headed person to be around that Ali enjoyed which put him in a good mood.

Now lets go back to boxing trainers again, most of them treat their boxers like livestock and not human beings. So to that end, my problem is the fact that they throw two beginners to see who has the killer instinct and who is the most vicious one of them all. This is WRONG and it is wrong because what you get might be an aggressive person who is good short term. But the kid that got smashed might be a diamond in the rough and may have the potential and character to have the innate drive to train long term if he was given a chance. Also this method does not challenge the trainers own wisdom because a true trainer will find a way to devise and invent radical and incredible method of improvement that allows the weakest member to grow very powerful. That is the essence of mastery.

Real boxing masters throw you in front of the mirror, they have you shift your weight from backfoot to front foot and then show you how to move your hips and shoulders. So now you are learning weight transferring and head movement through hips.

My TKD/TSD teacher is a young person in his early 20s, but I was extremely intrigued by his intelligence, his determination, his understanding and curiosity of various training modalities and knowing the name of the muscle, the strengthening, the stretching, the elongating the tissues for preventive measures. On top of that, he is extremely passionate and not jaded. This is a hallmark of a true grandmaster in the making.

Final thing to say about boxing trainers is that, it is very dangerous and very unethical to throw a beginner in to a vicious spar in hopes to see if they sink or swim to the top. Even in karate kid series, Kreese made sure kids were not hitting to the head.