MartialArtsNomad.com

As reported in The Vancouver Sun Today, Vancouver City Council this Thursday will be considering sanctioning Mixed Martial Arts fights. Currently they do not. Lets hope they see the advantages of supporting this great fusion of sports, where all disciplines of martial arts come together to know who the best of the best is going to be.

MMA is going to be allowed here
because Vancouver has become a
world center of martial arts.

In a city and region that boasts of its strong ties to Asia, we have over 50 Kung Fu schools that I have found out about. There are Aikido, Judo, and Karate schools that have been operating for many decades in the case of the Richmond Judo and Karate Clubs. Every community centre has some kind of martial arts program; every town and suburb in the region has many options available for martial arts schools, whether it is Tae-Kwon Do, Karate, Kung Fu, Brazilian Jiu-jitsu, Muay Thai or Tai-Chi – all have sunk roots into our communities. All the major disciplines are represented, and so are many of the rare ones as well, like clubs I have blogged about here before such as the Iado and Okinawan Karate Schools. Inside any of the martial arts schools and clubs that abound in Vancouver, students can get access to training by world champions, masters, grand masters, and senseis and sifus that have been practising and training for decades – all of them for the love of it, definitely not for the money.

Seating at tournaments like BCIT and Tiger Balm are packed to the limit. All age groups and a broad variety of disciplines compete – and both men and women. Every one is there to challenge themselves, to learn about themselves, to achieve goals of fitness and skill.

If Vancouver City Council gets it right, a vote to sanction big time MMA events will do much more then bring the big fights to town. That is just the big angle of the story that everyone can see. With its great number of practicioners and schools in one place, sanctionning MMA will be a great recognition of the work and effort by the hundreds of schools, clubs, the training and efforts of the thousands of students, all whose lives have all been enriched by the experience of martial arts. MMA is going to be allowed here because Vancouver has become a world center of martial arts.

Update

I was hopeful for much more. But City of Vancouver cant quite decide, they are passing the matter on to the provincial government to do it. At least they didnt shut the door entirely on it.