Is kickboxing a martial art?
Kickboxing is a combat sport. It has rules, referees, winners & losers. The whole goal of kickboxing is not self-defense or learning martial ethics (budo). It is about learning moves and training to ultimately win in the sport of kickboxing. Marial arts are for self-defense, war, martial ethics, exercise, etcetra. They are not for sport. There can be martial arts that are both martial art and combat sprot like Tae Kwon Do. It has moves meant for self-defense/war and has a sport side. A good kickboxer can be successful in the UFC. Do you mean with their kickboxing skills alone? Obviously they would lose on the ground pretty quickly. So, they wouldn’t make it that way. But, having kickboxing as your speciality in the UFC and you learn other skills for cagefighting you can make it work. Mirko Cro Cop, Mark Hunt, Maurice Smith, Chuck Lidell, Michael Bisping, several K-1 fighters (K-1 is a kickboxing organization in Japan), have all had some success in the cage.
