King's Kung-Fu& Tai Chi

Bart Vale

American professional wrestler and mixed martial artist

Born
4 June 1957, Miami
Citizenship
United States
Sport
karate
Occupation
mixed martial arts fighter, karateka, kickboxer, professional wrestler

Bart Vale (born May 4, 1957) is an American former kickboxer, mixed martial artist and professional wrestler. He is known for his "old school" American martial arts look, consisting of a mustache, mullet and American flag trunks.

Vale began his martial arts training in kenpo in 1970 and later traveled to Japan, where he competed in shoot-style professional wrestling. During his time in Japan, he studied several other martial arts and combined them with shoot wrestling to develop his own hybrid fighting system, which he called "shootfighting". He subsequently co-founded the International Shootfighting Association and promoted shootfighting events in the United States. Vale competed in early Mixed martial arts (MMA) competition and in K-1 Kickboxing.

In 2006, Black Belt magazine named him its Full-Contact Fighter of the Year and part of its Hall of Fame.

External links

Facts from Wikidata Q4865118 (CC0); quoted introduction from English Wikipedia (CC BY-SA 4.0). Data retrieved 2026-10-22.

Data: Wikidata (CC0 1.0); Wikipedia (English) (CC BY-SA 4.0). Retrieved 2026-10-22.