The number of different combat sports - martial arts fighting competitions with various different rules, has really grown over recent years, as have the number of fans that go along to competitions or tune in to watch the fights on tv or over the internet.

I created this hub to highlight all of the different combat sports that I love to watch, and to give a brief outline of what they are all about and what the rules are. You can watch online fight video from all of the sports listed below for free by clicking the link in this sentence, or you can learn how to watch pay per view events by online streaming by visiting by other hubpage online movie stream

If you are interested in fighting in any kind of combat sports you will first prepare yourself to fight and learn how to apply your martial arts technique through sparring

This is the biggest new kid on the block, and probably the biggest fight sport today behind boxing. MMA grew out of the 'Vale Tudo' no holds barred fighting competition of the 1990's, which were often bare knuckle and quite brutal.

Todays MMA is much more safety conscious, with fighters wearing gloves and divided into conventional weight categories, and referee's that are much quicker to stop fights before anyone gets hurt. Fights can be won either by submission, knockout, technical knockout or on points. Rules vary between competitions but they all allow punches, kicks, grappling and knees between standing fighters. Some competitons also allow elbows, and most disallow knees or stomps to fighters that are on the ground, as well as groin strikes, eye gauges and so on.

Most competitions use a cage rather than a ring, leading to the alternative name for this sport of 'cage fighting'.

Another relatively new combat sport, this time from china. Sanda is basically a full contact kung fu competition. Rather than taking place in a ring or cage Sanda competitions take place on an octagonal platform, and points can be gained by throwing an opponent to the ground, or throwing them off the platform, as well as by kicks and punches. The rules for striking are basically the same a in kickboxing, and fighting is stopped by the referee whenever someone is knocked or thrown down. San Shou is now very popular in China, and is growing fast in western countries

 One of the more established martial sports the biggest competition by far is called K1. Its basically blxing with kicks, hence the name.

Muay Thai, also sometimes just called Thai boxing, has a rich history in Thailand and surrounding countries in south east Asia. This is a kickboxing style sport which also allows elbow and knee strikes. The kicking techniques in Muay Thai are notable for the fact that fighters are taught to strike with the shins rather than their feet as is often the case in other combat sports, and many fighters spend a great deal of time kicking bamboo posts to strengthen their shin bones so that they don't injure themselves

 Taekwondo is actually a martial art rather than a sport, but Taekwondo competitions are probably the most popular semi-contact combat sports events around, so I thought it was worth including. There are also full contact Taekwondo tournaments, but these are much less popular and there are far fewer of them.

Taekwondo fighters wear padded helmets and chest protectors with targets drawn on them. Each target has a points score associated with it for a 'clean hit'. Most fights are 'semi-continous', meaning that once a point is scored the fight is stop and returned to the ready position.