Upon coming to Tokyo I began kickboxing as a hobby. I had originally done boxing while in the military living in Okinawa. To my surprise I wasn’t able obtain a boxing license in Japan due to regulations against people with tattoos.

At first I just joined my kickboxing gym with the goal of just training and boxing generally. Through the efforts of my coach which also happens to be the gym owner and a fight promoter, I began entering kickboxing matches. I was a little rough in the beginning, only winning due to my sheer size and power, but with time I developed a good sense of kickboxing and began to excel past all my gym members as well as my competition. I won my first professional fight in 40 seconds of the first round with a knockout. From there I continued fighting pretty frequently and beat most of my competition. My last fight however was a loss but only due to my lack of understanding the unique K-1 rules which penalized me for using multiple knee strikes. The points I lost from the red cards cost me the match but I wasn’t sad because I knew that in terms of skill and power I beat him.

Now I await the chance to return to boxing, hoping I can somehow get around the tattoo policies that prevent me from obtaining a Japanese boxing license.