The Martial Artist

The roundhouse kick jokes have a foundation: Chuck Norris was one of the best point-karate fighters of his generation, a teacher whose students included movie stars, and the founder of his own martial arts system. This page covers the real record.

Tang Soo Do in Korea

Norris began training in 1958 while stationed at Osan Air Base in South Korea with the U.S. Air Force. He studied Tang Soo Do, a Korean art with roots in Shotokan karate and older Korean striking traditions, and reached black belt before his tour ended. He also trained in judo. He has said that martial arts gave a shy, insecure young man the confidence he had never had, a theme he returned to in his books and, later, in his youth foundation.

Teaching in California

Back in the United States, Norris opened a karate school in Torrance in 1962. It grew into a chain of schools across Los Angeles, and his reputation as an instructor brought in celebrity students including Steve McQueen, Priscilla Presley, and Bob Barker. McQueen's encouragement was what pushed him toward acting.

Competition record

• 1964: Begins competing in point karate tournaments.
• 1967: Wins the All-American Karate Championship at Madison Square Garden.
• 1968: Wins the Professional Middleweight Karate Championship, the title he would hold until retiring from competition in 1974, undefeated as champion. He was also part of the U.S. team in the celebrated 1968 U.S.–Europe matches.
• 1969: Named Black Belt magazine's Fighter of the Year. Wins the Karate Triple Crown for most tournament wins in a year.
• 1974: Retires from competition.

He is widely described as a six-time world karate champion. His rivalries with Joe Lewis and Skipper Mullins, and his friendship with Bruce Lee, are part of the folklore of the era; Lee cast him in The Way of the Dragon because he wanted a genuine champion on screen.

Chun Kuk Do

In 1979 Norris founded the United Fighting Arts Federation, and in 1990 he formalized his own hybrid system, Chun Kuk Do ("the universal way"), drawing on Tang Soo Do, Shito-ryu karate, judo, Brazilian jiu-jitsu and other arts. The system was renamed the Chuck Norris System in 2015. Its code of honor, a list of principles about self-improvement and respect, is recited at schools that teach it. Norris himself held high-ranking black belts in Tang Soo Do, Taekwondo and Brazilian jiu-jitsu, the last awarded under the Machado brothers, with whom he trained for decades.

World Combat League

In 2005 Norris launched the World Combat League, a team-based, full-contact kickboxing competition designed to be fast and television-friendly. It ran for several seasons, with Norris deeply involved as founder and promoter.

KickStart Kids

Norris's most lasting contribution to martial arts may be the one that never appears in a fight record. In 1990 he founded Kick Drugs Out of America (renamed KickStart Kids in 2012), a foundation that places trained martial arts instructors in public schools as part of the regular curriculum. The program, based in Texas, teaches karate to middle and high-school students with an emphasis on discipline, respect and self-esteem. Norris regarded it as his life's work, and it continues to operate.

This section is written and maintained by the NothingButChuck editorial team. Biographical details are drawn from public reporting and Chuck Norris's own memoirs; we welcome corrections through the contact page. Jokes elsewhere on the site are jokes. This section isn't.