During the early years of Kyokushin Karate, three top Kyokushin representatives went to Thailand to challenge Muay Thai fighters. Each style fought under its own rules. The Japanese ended up using judo throws to compensate for their inferior striking, and won 2 fights to 1. Youtube seems to have footage of two of these fights: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MAXXg6BbKyw http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9zpMAVcvH5Q
Yep, Kyokushin came a long way since the early 60s. Apparently, the older Kyokushin manuals look very different. Not much in the way of leg kicking, for one thing. I suspect that the top Kyokushin guys from this period were amateurs, as opposed to the Thai professionals, FWIW.
Yeah maybe so.. quite a few guys with a Kyoshushin background have found success in k-1, but I don't think we will ever see guy like Hug again.. at least not for a very long time, that guy was something special.
Teixeira is apparently moving into MMA now, so we'll see how a top Kyokushin guy does in another arena. He didn't have much success in K-1, if I recall correctly.
Another nifty Karate vs. Muay Thai tidbit: (from http://web.archive.org/web/20040603051759/http://www.mikemiles.com/sport/hokb/1950s.cfm). And here's the fight: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wrw34fwf7xg
