Liotta Machida totally schools Rashad Evans winning the UFC title by KO. Machida, although practiced in other disciplines is mainly a Shotokan Karateka. He is unique in actually using his Karate style and strategy to beat his opponents in an impressive 15-0-0 record in mixed martial arts.

This is a great upleft for traditional martial arts like Karate and Tai kwondo which have been suffering an image problem lately. Machida is half Japanese half Brazilian. This also makes him the second Asian after BJ Penn to win a UFC title belt.
(Kazushi Sakuraba did win a UFC four man tournament belt before that but it was a one time tournament)

Asian pride!!! i wish Cung Le join UFC and beat Silva to get the belt then we have another Asian who hold the belt in UFC this prove white not dominant in the UFC

If Kung Le defeats Sliva, he will be the first 100% Asian to take a UFC belt.

Although I'm a critic of Karate, I'm glad that Karate has been useful for Machida. I'd like to see more people be successful with Karate, Tae Kwon Do, and Kung Fu even though I'm not much a fan of them.

ive been thinking...

Cung Le's Sanshou, Machida's Karate, Silva's Muai Thai...even GSP has karate...

perhaps traditional asian martial art has already proven themselves......

I just remember that Chuck Liddell came from a Kempo background also. I think the reason why Karate, Tae Kwon Do and Kung Fu don't get the recognition is because even though a lot of good fighters might have studied one of those forms of martial art. The techniques aren't really used in MMA fighting. Most the stand up is still muay thai and boxing and the ground game still mainly consists of bjj and wrestling.

For some reason I read Karaoke. I wondered how singing helped in UFC.

Machida is frickin RYU from street fighter lmao ...He is amazing because truly fights in a shotokan karate fashion and nobody can mess with him so far. He's too fast and powerful. He looks like he is point sparring lol. I love how after the fight he says "Karate is back!" and encrouages people to go for their dreams. Maybe we'll see that he is a great BJJka too. I hope Cung Le goes into UFC, he's still tossing guys around like back when he was fighting sanshou. Those kungfu/shuajiao guys have amazing strength training.

I know Korea is making their appearance in MMA but why is it that we don't see fighters from out of China? They have so many combat kungfu practitioners and they do have their MMA.

Don't forget Judo!

TMA have always proven themselves imho

Karate is good so is TKD which is essentially a conglomerataion of several Okinawanan styles, the problem with them is the number of schools are bull$hit. Its hard to become a competent ruleset when the major rule set you fight under is AAU Point Sparring which the Majority of "fighters" train. Their is a big differnce between this a and the Ippon style point sparing lyoto practices.
Compare- http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mlKERcw67R8
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gkGP0AM14F0

I've been following Cung Le since I was 15. Im 26 now. Im a huge fan mainly because he represents where im from. He even beat up my little brothers Karate teacher in a promoted fight.


But I also think hes one of the most over rated fighters. And hed lose against the premium UFC fighters.


Trust me I want him to prove me wrong...


Let the flame begin.

I know this doesn't have much to do with much, but is this article true?

http://sports.yahoo.com/mma/blog/cagewrite...?urn=mma,150216

Machida drinks his own urine??

"Lyoto ' The Golden Dragon' Machida"

lmfao....awsome....

I don't want to think about it like that.

Why would he say something like this in public?

i have no clue.

heres a vid..... kinda hard to say its fake now...

http://mmablips.dailyradar.com/video/ufc_9..._training_with/

No doubt Machida won but he has a BJJ background and the Shotokan pedigree from his Japanese heritage.
I would only agree that karate has proved its worth by more karetaka winning in UFC. If anythng, it is wrestling, judo and BJJ added to a kicking art that make the individual well rounded so that if the kicking game failed then at close quarters you can back it up with BJJ or some other art.

That is Cung Le problem! If he ever loses his kicking with shuaijiao, he has no close quarters (I hope he is practicing) game to come back though his boxing will serve some good but nothing to close the gap!

Machida is one badass mofo. He made Rashad look like a C-Level fighter and Rashad was an undefeated Champ that just knocked off Liddell and Griffin.

As for Cung Le, he's awesome too but I agree that he would not be elite in the UFC. TMA is making it's way back. Imagine a Sanshou guy with Cung Le's level mixed with wrestling and BJJ.

But in all seriousness, what people need to understand is that MMA is not elitist and limited to just a certain group of arts. Even though wrestling, BJJ, MT, and western boxing are what the majority of what combatants use in the sport, it's not limited specifically to those forms. Any style can be used and as long as you use it well and mix it up with other forms, you can do well. Guys like Machida and to a certain degree Cung Le proves that traditional martial arts can be a force in MMA. At the end of the day, it's not the art but the practicioner.

alot of the guys that train mma use to be in martial arts, those who haven't you can tell they're too sloppy and brutish. they call martial arts 'bullshido' because a lot of artists are fu-king ridiculous, but when they know how to harness it it's deadly.

What Machida proves is that it's not the style it's the individual and his talents, discipline, and training. All TMA's serve a purpose but are you capable of properly funneling them properly? Are you like Machida?

Hate to spoil everyone's fun but Machida does not purely train in Karate, although his style is.

It's more of a meditating thing, as far as stand up goes, he trains more in muay thai, kickboxing, boxing, and full contact sparring...And extensively in BJJ/wrestling. Remember Shotokan is point base karate, not full contact like Kyokushin Karate.

Without training in BJJ, MT, Boxing he wouldn't even be in the UFC.

chuck liddel is karate.

and machida doesn't know any boxing. he did NO boxing footwork and NO boxing head movement. did you see the rashad evans fight? evans moved like a boxer/kickboxer machida did not.
machida's ability to stay standing is BJJ and Sumo training. more so sumo.

also no muay thai was incorporated as well. knees exist in karate. his striking is pure karate, and of course ground is jiujitsu.

!!!!!!!!!!!!! don't use huge generalizations! the days of blah blah blah muay thai/bjj = best have long been over.

oh yeah and sakuraba was the first asian ufc title holder for whatever weight class he was in.
yushin okami is very good, bj penn is half korean, and Dong Hyun Kim is also really good

i don't think cung le is gonna fight much anymore. he has become enough of a celebrity to live off of it

Machida's striking and stance is pure Karate and it's obvious his experience in other MA plays a major role in his ability to fight like he does.

Cung is getting older. I wish he fought MMA back in his Sanshou days.

Machida is also a BJJ black belt and an experience grappler. His ability to defend takedowns (and it is no problem if it does go to the ground) allows him to utilize his Karate.

No pure Karate fighter is in MMA.

I didn't see the Evans/Machida fights but I've seen other fights of Machida. I practice Pradal Serey and I'm not too familiar with any kind of Karate. In Machida's other fights, his kicks looks clearly like Pradal serey and muay thai kicks, unless there are shin kicks in karate also. Same as Chuck Liddel who has a Kenpo background. His kicks are clearly muay thai also. I want to give credit to karate, but until I see someone using karate more in their stand up game. It's hard for me to be a believer.

If your talking about round kick, yes everyone using the shin(sometimes instep). I remember back in karate many years back, my teacher said the impact surface was the ball of the foot, what a bizarre way to kick. But even from the full-contact days, round kicks used shin/instep.

The real difference to see if a person started as Muay Thia or karate is whether they chamber the lower leg. Karateka do this which gives the kick a whipping action while Muay Thai fighters keep a relatively stiff leg while kicking.

Pradal Serey, is that a type of silat?

I think it's Khmer style of fighting like Muang Thaii, Muang Lao etc. But yeah a low leg kick will pretty much look the same especially modified for MMA.

Machida is not just a karateka, if he was there's no way he'd even be in the UFC. He is also a BJJ black belt, sumo expert, trains Muay Thai and western style wrestling. Karate is his main base but he is also an extremely well-rounded MMArtist that incorporates everything together. Also he's been doing this since he was an infant. People need to stop getting carried away about how Karate will invade MMA. Not every Karateka is a Lyoto Machida. He proved that Karate can be a devastating force in MMA but in no way shape or form has his career proved that Karate>>>>other martial art forms.

Basically he just proved that it all boils down to the fighter.

Exactly, it's not the style it's the practicioner. It's like asking someone "Who would win, an NCAA champion wrestler or a BJJ black belt?" It depends on who is the better man between the two, not what the better art is.

Lyoto Machida is Evan Sugar daddy lol here is the video of the fight

Part 2
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uZuFYoIfAGM

I cant agree with you guys Cung Le is still strong and have a lot of fight in him. I can see him fight 7 more years if he still love the sport and in MMA you need to have a lil bit of everything not just your main specialty that is why the sport is call Mix Martial Art you mix it up and throw it out on your opponent

No. I think everyone is in-the-car with you. Its just we're focusing on karate because it was belittled for so long. Back in the beginning, karateka were losing because they had no ground skills.

lmao Gardner
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CRYcslZpHTI

Pradal Serey is just like Muay Thai, but Cambodians will tell you that Muay Thai is just like Pradal Serey. Pretty much it's from Cambodia. The kicks I"m used to seeing in Karate are the kicks with the ball of the feet. That's why I get confused when people say Machida uses Karate striking techniques.

Thanks VK4life for the link . I can't believe I couldn't find it.

np buddy. Machida really give Rashad an @$$ beating lol

Maybe for front kicks, sorta like the Teep. The roundhouse are the same except they chamber the kicks.

Denis Kang is a very good fighter as well. Has good standup, submissions and knows the takedown game.

Even though good Shotokan Karate is pretty all-round, you still have to adapt to UFC opponents. But that's what Karate is, it never stands still and continues to develop.
Like someone earlier mentioned, most karate school are $hit. A lot of "masters" got thought by some fat japanese guy that filled his pockets but didn't actually teach anything useful.

Karate uses kicks with heel, ball and ehm how you call it in english, top surface flat area lol.
We also use the shin. Like I said it's pretty all-round.
We pretty much train everything. Only the sport kumite area of Karate Shotokan is way too soft, so you see most Karateka's in these kind of games with a Kyokushin or Ashihara background since they do knock outs.
But it's cool someone with a shotokan background performs so well.
But it's not new that Karate does well, I mean, Bas Rutten has a Karate background, and if you look at K1 fights, the big dutch stars, most of them have a karate background.

Check this vid of Machida and Machida's dad about Karate Shotokan: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CzCXvcUbb6o

and that is the only thing karate is good for. and UFC is ONLY a sport, not an art...So what does that say about karate...lol

Not everything obviously >_>

UFC is a sport, many think the techniques used can be effective in the street or war(hand-to-hand).

Your riding Karate pretty hard. Why do you think this? What martial arts do you practice?

PFFFFFTTT Kang is the epitome of overrated.

Uhhh.. who the hell is Denis Kang?

A BJJ black belt and MMA fighter who is best known for dominating in Spirit MC.
He is also a hapa and is well known enough that my 13 year old cousin who is a chick knows his name.
He is also know for getting his @$$ handed to him by the Zainichi Yoshiro Akiyama.

I think he lost a couple of times after Akiyama also. He had one good year.

comes to no surprise, like i've always said. any art, if trained correctly with regular full contact sparring instead of bull$hit demos and breaking boards at McDojos, can be effective in the ring

And he got KTFO by little Kaoklai from Thailand in kickboxing.

I couldn't tell Kang and Penn had Asian blood in them.

Where have you been at bro? You going to the worlds this year?