TKD lesson #1

**bopinator** · Posted On: 10/21/2008 4:20am

Sport is compulsory at my school and as BJJ is not an option I needed to find a sport that gave me maximum time to do BJJ. The most conveniently placed sport in both training time and days was TKD so I signed up.

I've read abit about TKD on these forums and I found that some of the stereotypes held true. It start off with some random stretching and stance changing. I then got taught some kicks by a red belt 3 or 4 years my junior. I got told to kinda lift my knee and rotate as I snapped my foot, the kid really didn't give me much detail and I could feel that I was doing something wrong.

Then the main instructor called us in and we did what I found to be a fairly impressive core strenght routine (although most of the students got halfway through and couldn't do the rest.) then we did a race where we ran, kicked a pad, ran, kicked a pad which seemed kind of pointless.

From there we did side kicks which i tried looking like an absolute fool, not knowing how to se them up and trying to balance myself properly. At around this point the instructor gave the funniest analogy in a quite solomn voice he goes "When you lift your knee up about to kick its like loading a bullet in a rifle."

We then did one step sparring which to me seemed kind of lame...during this period i got a lecture on periphary vision. The 1-steps just seemed very unrealistic to me, one of them involved some sort of standing key-lock...
Well anyway all up I thought the lesson was quite good compared to what I heard but I really do prefer BJJ.

**pontoon** · Posted On: 10/21/2008 4:35am

I remember when i did tkd as a school sport. Two kinds of people ended up signing for it, people from the special needs section of the school, and all the drop kick thugs. I enjoyed hitting people from both these groups. :laughing1 But seriously, it was all so terribly weak, half assed warm ups and conditioning, one step sparring and kata set to music (the fucking spice girls!). I should have gotten onto the instructor's bs when he told me that "Judo is really great. As a sport" this coming form someone teaching olympic style sparring.

**bopinator** · Posted On: 10/21/2008 4:38am

yea I enjoyed the conditioning actually although I dunno if it was balanced but I just don't see myself getting any practical skill out of this TKD if I don't get taught the details of the kicks. ALso does anyone know if the standing keylock i got taught was legit.

**Lily** · Posted On: 10/21/2008 5:19am

bopinator - what were your other options for sport? Was there athletics? Rugby? Wrestling? Swimming? Hockey? Basketball? They'd all have been better options than High school TKD.

**bopinator** · Posted On: 10/21/2008 5:22am

I play rugby in winter, I have played basketball but am bored of it aswella s it taking up my saturday. no wrestling, hockey for winter an girls only and I son't swim, athletics is somethign you can do on top of compulsory another sport. I nearly chose fencing over TKD.