Is Muay Thai the best striking martial art? When it comes to grappling, there's a legitimate debate to be had between judo vs bjj vs wrestling. I, myself lean on some kind of wrestling but I can see the argument for judo/bjj. When it comes to striking, muay thai/dutch kickboxing seems to be clearly superior to say karate/taekwondo/kick boxing/ boxing, either due to more realistic training or better techniques.
>>213395each of the 3 grappling martial arts are lethalkarate is good for what it was developed for. unsuspecting opponents like a mugger who has never been in a real fight post high schooltkd is on a similar playing field but used in sport outside of tkd needs to be pair with something else. Like that fat guy who did the reverse kick in ufc.if your goal is to br a hot headed fire cracker who thinks he's immune to bulletsdo boxing or bjj.muay thai will humble you fast as fuck considering it's a martial art where there will always be someone better than you in some aspect
>>213395>When it comes to striking, muay thai/dutch kickboxing seems to be clearly superior to say karate/taekwondo/kick boxing/ boxingNo martial art is best by virtue of specialization. Muay Thai is a very effective system, but its got its holes like everything else.>karateKarate is honestly underrated in today's age. It was rightfully derided from all the strip mall karate guys getting their asses kicked, but karate historically has played a huge part in the development of kickboxing. Modern kickboxing literally comes from karate and dutch kickboxing takes influences from kyokushin as much as it takes from muay thai. There are still many high level kickboxers/MMA fighters from karate backgrounds who've won world titles.>TKDSimilar boat to karate with less historical significance. Not the best out of the box, but has some advantages and high level guys can make it work.>boxingBoxing has the best punchers. While it can't be exported wholesale to other striking arts, there's much value to be had in training it in isolation and adapting it to whatever striking you do. A problem many muay thai fighters have had historically when transitioning to kickboxing is dealing with guys with boxing-heavy styles who can get past kicking range and stay out of clinch range. MT's lack of head movement often caused them to get clipped.
>>213395Yes, kinda. Stadium MT rules don't emphasize the hands, so they sometimes get rocked by the Dutch and K-1 style kickboxing. The Wonderboy/MVP full-contact blitzing style is also pretty good, but the competitive circuit that bred those guys is basically dead.
>>213395Overall, yeah MT stands apart from everything else. Dutch kickboxing is the only close rival and even then people like Dekkers struggled against the Thais (somewhat to do with scoring/cheating tbf)If you want to see what works, watch golden age K-1:>MT>Dutch kickboxinge.g. Peter Aerts>Kyokushin/Seido/other KK offshoots like Enshine.g. Andy Hug, Masaaki Satake>'Kickboxing' (American I guess?) with TKD baseCro Cop, Patrick SmithThat's pretty much it. American Kickboxing was sort of the expansion pack for TKD (i.e. adds close range fighting and boxing) and could turn them into good fighters. But that has now vanished in favour of MT as the ruleset is just better for MMADutch kickboxing isn't really available outside holland so for most people it doesn't come into itSo really you're left with>MT>Kyokushin + offshootsAnd as KK tends to get taken apart by MT in practice (not always, but a lot), MT comes out on top
