I was thinking about potential long term health downsides of practicing martial arts especially kickboxing (I am not worried about short time complications due to injury - such is life), particularly with regard to head injury/increasing the likelihood of conditions affecting the brain.
As I understand it getting knocked out is not healthy at all and I am not planning on doing any competitions. However, what about less impactful hits to the head (not causing knock out/unconsciousness). Should they also be ideally completely avoided? I am unsure how I should place the risks of light/heavy sparring compared to risks other activities entail.
I suspect it is a gradient of risk based on both the intensity and total number / overall “volume” of impacts sustained over the lifespan, but unfortunately I don’t know / can’t provide quantitative data on the comparative risk between “lighter” and “heavier” head impacts.
I am not a Doctor, so I can’t answer your health questions, but I have been involved in boxing for over 20 years.
In my experience, sparing at a GOOD gym is usually controlled and fairly safe. Of course there will be injuries and the occasional KO, but it’s fairly rare. Fighters are usually in the ring to work on their skills and coaches try to maintain a safe tempo.
However, don’t get me wrong, I have been in my fair share of “ring wars.” Stay away from gyms that allow wars, someone always will sustain an injury.
If you’re just training for fitness you don’t need to spar or at least spar often. I train for fitness now, I skip rope, shadow box, hit the heavy-bags, double-end bag , and speed bag, finish off with some core, and call it a day. Very rarely will I spar.
If you want to spar, I would train in the gym for a while and see how the sessions go. If fighters aren’t coming back or you’re seeing injuries/KO, walk away.