“It’s an old school thing” – Jonathan Di Bella laments kickboxing being illegal in Canada

Canadian-Italian champion striker Jonathan Di Bella has established a successful professional kickboxing career but laments that the striking art is rendered illegal in his home country.

Mentored by his father, who was a two-time kickboxing world champion, the Quebec native started early in the sport and has been stellar in it since.

Jonathan Di Bella, 27, turned professional in 2016 and won his first 10 fights all the way to 2019. He took his burgeoning kickboxing career to an even higher level when he claimed the vacant strawweight kickboxing world title in his ONE Championship debut in October 2022. To do so, he defeated Chinese phenom Zhang Peimian by unanimous decision.

But while his kickboxing career has skyrocketed immensely, a part of Di Bella feels bad that Canada has yet to fully embrace the sport.

He shared this in an interview on The MMA Hour with Ariel Helwani, saying:

“I have no idea. I think it's a rule that never got accepted and it's like an old school thing. In America, in North America, kickboxing is not the biggest right now, it's MMA that’s the biggest and boxing. But that's why I want to change, that's what I want to change, and the platform for ONE Championship is the biggest and hopefully, like, we can come to Canada one day and change the rules.”

Check out what he said below:

Jonathan Di Bella was last in action back in October at ONE Fight Night 15 in Thailand, where he successfully defended his world title against Australian challenger Danial Williams by unanimous decision.

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Jonathan Di Bella finds kickboxing home in New York

While he awaits for Canada to fully accept kickboxing, Jonathan Di Bella is grateful to have found a home in New York in the United States to showcase what he is capable of as a fighter.

Since making his professional debut in 2016, the Team Di Bella Kickboxing standout has become a staple in the kickboxing scene in New York City.

In the same interview with Helwani, Di Bella shared his thoughts on 'The Big Apple' in relation to his career and about trying MMA, saying:

“That’s why I call New York my fighting home and like yeah, they adopted me like New York adopted me, and yeah I'm very popular in Brooklyn especially, that's where I started my first pro fight. So yeah I have a lot of fans here.”

He added:

“Of course, I always think about MMA [because of the rule that makes kickboxing illegal in certain parts of Canada]. My dad coached a few times, some of the UFC fighters and that's where he met you for the first time backstage at UFC in Bell Center in Toronto.”

After successfully defending the ONE strawweight kickboxing world title in October, Di Bella expressed his readiness to take on all-comers for his title, including a showdown with Japanese kickboxing superstar Takeru Segawa.