A word on Taekwon-do

[Ronin]

Ok, a serious thread on TKD for a change.

First, let me state that my experince is about 90% ITF and 10% WTF.
I have had instruction on TKD from Park Jong Soo, Dino Hennings, Don James and a few others.
Those of you in the know, in regards to TKD in Canada, well recognise those names.

I have seen 3 TKD stylist in action for real, the aforementiond Hennings and a couple of others, while bouncing at couple of different strip clubs.

They handled themselves just fine.

I have had the previlage of seeing some of the TOP ITF guys doing HARD contact sparring, ala kyokushin, and I was very immpressed.
Some of the best HAND techniques I have seen, have been from TKD, including a ridgehand that KO'd a 6-2 240 lbs 3rd degree BB in an "light" contact tournament, it was thrown by a 5-8 175lb korean, while fighting for the "grand championship" title.

I have see the side of guys faced smashed by a FRONT leg roundhouse kick.

ALL the above were ITF guys.

I have seen a few WTF guys in action too, including one who KO'd a guy with a spinning hook kick that was so fast, it was still a blur in slow motion.

Yes, TKD has NO grappling, the half a dozen locks "borrowed" from hapkido don't count.

But, all the TKD guys that I still talk to have ALL cross trainined in or are cross training in some sort of Grappling.

I don't know WHEN TKD took the road to pansyville, I don't know if it was the olympics or just the natural dilution of the art, BUT, there still are some old school hardcore guys out there.

I remember one time at Park's school, some guys were kicking the heavy bag, and I mean HEAVY, one of those 200lbs jobs, and they were tapping it and that kind of shit.
Park, in his business suit, comes walking along with me, I was telling him about the up coming trails for the 1988 olympic team, he sees them out of the corner of his eye, walks by and BAM !!!!!
Side kicks the bag so fast, it was a blur !!
The bag hardly swayed , it just buckled over where the kick hit.
We continued walking, he only words to me, in his broken english:
" I don't know where I went wrong".

[tkdan28]

At my dojang (http://www.blackbeltworld.com) our head master, who is Korean, keeps in close contact with Korean TKD. For the last 6 months we have had about 15 'interns' rotating through our school (there's four schools in the system). The guys and girls are early to mid-20 and have a high-level of TKD experience. They help run the classes and work with us individually. The best part is watching the interns play around with each other and the higher belts at the school. those guys have got some skill... it is all a matter of where you train.

edit: change language to not exclude the girl interns.. they have skills and are hot as well... fuck me I'm a guy.

[albert]

A huge problem with TKD is the WTF. Some of their claims are just bullshit (e.g. the 2000 year-old history, how their TKD is for "self-defense").

That said, it's still a pretty good cardio workout, and at least you get to do full-contact, non-point sparring, in a limited kicks only context. Of course I'm sure there are some JSW (www.jsw.com) type bullshit places that don't even have these things.

If there was no WTF and there was only ITF TKD, would the state of TKD be any better? I don't know. I haven't had any experience with ITF, but from what I've seen it can vary from sine wave mysticism, to the Polish TKD (resembled kickboxing) that Matt W. posted a while ago, to this Kyokushin-inspired stuff that Ronin mentions.

As mentioned, you have to judge the school on its own merits. I'm sure there are some good WTF school out there, I just strongly believe the WTF organization as a whole is total bullshido.

[MaverickZ]

one of the biggest problems that i see with tkd right now (non-wtf) is the prevalence of the point-stop sparring tournaments. there are serious TKD athletes who are very very good, but they train for this kind of tournament. this stuff also goes on in polish tkd as well, but not as much it seems. they need to be revised and come up with a better tournament setup. once the style of competition changes, many schools will change the training regimen i believe.

[Ronin]

So, why did THAT start then?
Was it the instructors catering to pussy students, or was it students getting "pussified" by instructors that were unwilling to keep the "hardcore" aspects of TKD around?
Or was it an abundance of under qualified Instructors?

[shironinja]

My experiences with TKD are 90% WTF and 10% ITF. I have taken years of TKD under Kee Ha.

Those of you in the know, in regards to TKD in Canada, will recognise that name too.

I've had many classes go by without any use of hand technique. I had to take drop-in boxing classes to balance things out -- and then when I went back to TKD I would get criticized for having my hands up by my face in that they feel the lead hand should be out and by chin level while the other one may be back by the head.

I tested this stance further in kickboxing divisions and found I was TOO open for an incoming hook!

I also found the techniques clashing too much ... so am now happily taking MT and also BJJ to work on the ground game.

I would not recommend TKD to anyone other than a child.

[Ronin]

Kee Ha sucks, always has.

[shironinja]

^ I believe my comments speak for what I feel about his teaching too.

But in Canada you gotta recognize he and his brothers are those who have had major impact to shape WTF to current state.

[MaverickZ]

well, i can't say i know how it started. but from my understanding the point-stop competition has a long history in the old school 60's karate tournaments. but i've heard that those were much more brutal than it is now. to me it seems like the strategies for scoring points were refined as time went on. you didn't thrown as hard a kick because that might put you off balance, so you threw just hard enough to score. and you didn't have to punch as hard to score. when i used to compete (about 6 or 7 years ago), there was no "trembling impact" rule. i think it's just the nature of hte beast, and the refinement of hte strategies that led the pussification of this kind of sparring. i'm sure parents talking to the teachers about "Will Billy get hurt?" and the insurance costs didn't help.

[Ronin]

Originally posted by shironinja
^ I believe my comments speak for what I feel about his teaching too.

But in Canada you gotta recognize he and his brothers are those who have had major impact to shape WTF to current state.

Yes, they all suck :mad:

[Ronin]

There used to be a magazine in the 70's and 80's called taekwondo something ot other, I can't remember, anyways, every issue they would have a technique special, and you it was always a hand and a foot one.
There was never this 80% feet thing, it was always 60-40 at the most.

[TxKickerLady]

My teacher at the junior college, Gary Roark, was of the AKBBA school - referred to in the day as "Texas blood and guts karate". In addition to tae kwon do, we also learned self-defence, ground defence, some throws, and in our sparring we'd use backfists, ridge & knife hands, use our legs to block...we were encouraged to try different techniques to find what worked best.

Then, I moved here and enrolled in the only TKD school, which was WTF....Sparring was a continual exercise in frustration at first, because of all the techniques which AREN'T allowed.
But there is a big emphasis on speed and footwork, timing and sparring strategy, so I have definately benefitted from that. And we learned one - step sparring that was intended to show how to apply blocks, kicks, etc. as self defense; but as an all around martial art, WTF style is sadly lacking.

[Matt W.]

I have a 1st dan in an "ITF style" (A different org under a GM that broke away from Choi), with no WTF experience at all. I also spend a lot of time on the ITF-information.com BBS. IMO, all the problems with the ITF stem back to Choi. He was a MAist of dubious ability, who totally taught/bought into the "too deadly for the ring" crap. Any point sparring emphasis in the ITF comes from him. He was also a egomaniac who took credit for all TKD (while continually denouncing the WTF) and left the ITF organization in shambles after his death due to his poor leadership.

What you are left with is a mixed bag when it comes to the ITF. You get some people who train hardcore, like kyokushin guys, or kickboxers. But you also get a lot of people/schools that are nothing but forms and point sparring.

Let's not forget, the 2 ITF world champions that tried their hand at K1 got destroyed. Not just beat, but absolutely destroyed.

Matt

[Ronin]

Choi was all that, yet his first and even second generation students were excellent.
Go figure.
But, isn't that the case with MOST MA ?

[Rigante]

I got my 1st Dan in Taekwondo in 1973. At that time it was 40% hands and 60% feet. The staple kicks were front,roundhouse,back spin and side kick (they had both a side thrust kick and a side snap kick) Only a few people did wheel kicks or crescent kicks.They were essentially like shotokon except they had more lateral movement and didnt score punches to the head (which I found out the hard way sparring with shotokan 1st). The sparring was at most medium contact. We had no pads back then. There was zero grappling or locks. However some of us cross trained with the Judo guys who shared the dojo with us. It worked ok for the street. Actually all our guys did well, but back in the early 70's only the Martial arts people had a clue of what to do with fighting a kicker and often people would quit fighting if they thought they fighting a "karate guy" because no one knew much about it.

[Ronin]

There was never a "problem" with training in other systems of combat before, I wonder when people got so anal about it?