Taiei Kin

Kin Taiei (Korean: 김태영, Hanja: 金泰泳; born July 8, 1970) is a Korean-Japanese light heavyweight karateka, kickboxer and mixed martial artist competing in K-1 and DREAM. He's also a karate instructor and a trainer for professional fighters. His name is sometimes pronounced as "Kim Tae Yong" in Korean.

Before switching to MMA, Kin was a distinguished fighter in the K-1, praised by both Peter Aerts and Ernesto Hoost as the best fighter to come out of Asia.

Biography

Early years

Kin Taiei(金泰泳) was born as the eldest son in Amagasaki city of Hyogo prefecture, Japan on July 8, 1970. As he is the eldest son, he's got a younger brother. Both of his parents worked till late at night, he was sent to Karate dojo for combing the care with a nursery school.　He took an interest in football (soccer) at 4th year of elementary school, and dropped out training karate at 6th year. He won the Japanese national championship for junior high schools at the 3rd year. When he was a student of Kobe Korean Senior High school, he tried to start practicing boxing because he had a longing for foreign boxers, but he joined karate team in his school because his parents objected strongly. For this reason, he also joined the karate team of Korea University in Tokyo when he became a university student. During his university life, he participated a full contact karate championship promoted by Sato juku, but he was beaten by Nobuaki Kakuda. Although he lost, he was evaluated highly by Kazuyoshi Ishii, and he was invited to Seidokaikan. Thus, Kin became to be a student of Seidokaikan in Osaka after graduation of university.