Ross Levine embraces trailblazing role with Karate Combat

Ross Levine sees himself as a pioneer who can help take the sport of karate to the next level.

The American is set to challenge for his first Karate Combat title on June 25 in Florida against champion Shahin Atamov.

Levine earned his shot at Atamov by beating ‘The Iberian Bull’ Igor de Castaneda in a final eliminator in May, a few months after successfully making his debut against Andrei Grinevich.

Understandably there is a lot of hype behind him, something which he embraces with open arms.

“Absolutely yeah, I look at myself as a trailblazer for Karate Combat,” Levine exclusively told GiveMeSport.com.

“There’s so many people that are coming up in my footsteps that are literally where I was when I reached a certain point in sports karate six or seven years ago where it was like I’d fought the best guys, I’d won the biggest tournaments, where do I go now?

“But there was nowhere for me to go so I had to transition to boxing, kickboxing, Muay Thai, MMA, you know, there wasn’t an outlet, and now there’s finally an outlet.

“It’s so funny, when I was doing sport karate, all the kickboxers and MMA guys were like, ‘Oh, he’s just a karate guy who can’t really fight’, and then we started to dominate there.

“And now in Karate Combat, everyone’s saying ‘Oh, he’s not a martial artist, he’s just a kickboxer’.

“Like Shahin said he’s got 26 years in karate, that’s cool – I’ve got 27 years in Taekwondo and sport karate.

“So it’s all the same man, sport is sport, and karate is karate. In my opinion, combat sports and prizefighting are separate, it’s totally different. This is my world so I can’t wait to pave the way for the next group to come up and shine because I know they can.”

Atamov is a formidable matchup on paper having fought