Pankration/MMA

Pankration was an unarmed combat sport introduced into the GreekOlympic Games in 648 BC. The athletes used boxing and wrestling techniques but also others, such as kicking, holds, joint-locks, and chokes on the ground, making it similar to modern mixed martial arts. The term comes from the Greek παγκράτιον [paŋkrátion], meaning ‘all of power’, from πᾶν (pan) ‘all’ and κράτος (kratos) ‘strength, might, power’.

The athletes engaged in a pankration competition – i.e., the pankratiasts – employed a variety of techniques in order to strike their opponent as well as take him to the ground in order to use a submission technique.

At the time of the revival of the Olympic Games (1896), pankration was not reinstated as an Olympic event.

Neo-pankration (modern pankration) was first introduced to the martial arts community by Greek-American combat athlete Jim Arvanitis in 1969 and later exposed worldwide in 1973 when he was featured on the cover of Black Belt magazine. Arvanitis continually refined his reconstruction with reference to original sources. His efforts are also considered pioneering in what became mixed martial arts (MMA).

The International Olympic Committee (IOC) does not list pankration among Olympic sports, but the efforts of Savvidis E. A. Lazaros, founder of modern Pankration Athlima, the technical examination programma, the endyma, the shape of the Palaestra and the terminology of Pankration Athlima, in 2010 the sport was accepted by FILA, known today as United World Wrestling (UWW), which governs the Olympic wrestling codes, as an associated discipline and a “form of modern Mixed Martial Art“. Pankration was first contested at the World Combat Games in 2010.

Modern pankration has a ruleset resembling amateur MMA, divided into two rulesets:

  • “Elite” (less restrictive; punches and kicks to the body and head are allowed)
  • “Traditional” (more restrictive, i.e. no punches or kicks to the head, although “controlled round house kicks to the head” are allowed)

Soccer kicks, hammer fists, elbow strikes to the head, body slams, leglocks, spine locks and any kind of striking while groundfighting are banned in both styles. Targeting any of the following areas of the body is also disallowed: neck, back of the head, throat, knees, elbows, joints, kidneys, groin and along the spine.

Fighters wear protective gear (MMA gloves, shin pads, headgear) and fight in a standard wrestling mat.

Our Pankration/MMA program (from September of 2023) is Karate (Okinawan Karate) based program oriented on Pankration/MMA rules as only Amateur MMA form allowed in Ontario.