I'm not very knowledgeable about Karate, but i was wondering what level of public interest Karate tournaments had in Japan? I've seen at least one example of a fairly large scale spectated tournament being held by the k1 organization in the early 90's, but wasn't sure if that was more an oddity than the norm?
No, i know, but in the early 90's k1 used to host something they called the karate world cup, which appeared to be Kyokushin rules in a boxing ring. [ame="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nN1rDFYuE-0"]K 1 Illusion Karate World Cup 1993 - YouTube[/ame]
I thought it was a kickboxing origination founded in 1993 (of all years) by the founder of Seidokaikan Karate?
It was, but in the first years of it's existence (1993-95) it emphasized it's roots in full contact karate by holding regular matches under what appeared to be a kyokushin rules set, a number of high level karateka also competed under the k1 kickboxing rules set as well. (Andy Hug, Francisco Filho, Glaube Feitosa)