Kickboxing boxing competitons 2000-2013
We may have some new amateur fighters competing in 2022, stay tuned . . .
Over the years we had quite a few students compete in amateur kickboxing and boxing matches. It was before Iphones, so I don’t have a lot of photos.
Actually, having students compete in these amateur shows is how Master Zacharatos started refereeing and judging the professional fights. He’d practice officiating at the amateur shows (the smaller tournaments are called “smokers”), and I kept a record to show he was getting experience. If one of our students was competing, then Master Zacharatos would get another referee and judge for that fight, so there wouldn’t be a conflict of interest. Then after he had alot of practice documented, another referee he knew from his days as a fighter, recommended Master Zacharatos to the California State Athletic commission (CSAC), and that’s how he got in. He’s been referring and judging shows since 2000.
A funny story, they used to want you to wear a bow tie to referee the fights, so I remember going to a tux store asking, do you have any bow ties that can resist blood stains!
I did acquire some interesting observations when comparing Kickboxing/Boxing competitions with Karate competitions.
In full contact Kickboxing/Boxing competitions you’re going for the knockout and there is no penalty for drawing blood of your opponent, but with Karate competitions, where you just tap to score a point, you can actually be disqualified if the contact is too hard or you make your opponent bleed.
But I noticed, more times than not, that in the more brutal of the two sports, there was more respect and good sportsmanship in the kickboxing/boxing matches, than in the karate competitions. Sometimes at karate tournaments you’d get parents of the young karate kids competing with bad attitudes shouting inappropriate things like, “just kill him”!
A funny story, I remember at one karate tournament, a parent had a bad attitude and was upset we were cheering for our student, I guess no one was cheering for his child. He came over to Master Zacharatos who was sitting on the floor, and said, “I think you should leave” Master Zacharatos always kept his cool, and just thought the guy was a jerk, and quietly said, “make me”, but never got up off the floor, and went back to talking to his students. Then our student Jeremy Luyties, quietly went over and took the guy to the side and said, “I really don’t think you should threaten this guy (Master Zacharatos), he’s a former professional kickboxing champion top 10 in the world! Then the guy came and apologized to Master Zacharatos.
It goes to show, you don’t need to escalate things and turn them into a fight, when you’re confident and have nothing to prove you just don’t engage.
Many of our young kickboxing students have told us how much confidence they gained training with us, and it actually kept them out of fights, not get them into more fights!
