AUSSIE

Men are better. Sorry i'm not trying to be sexist, just realistic. I've never even met a girl who can do more than about 10 push-ups and thats no lie! The girls in my TKD class usually do either situps or "girl pushups" (where you have your knees touching the ground) when the rest of us guys are doing pushups, because the girls just aren't strong enough to do normal pushups. Theres 2 instructors in my TKD class, a man and a woman. I reckon the man is a better instructor because he is more hardcore and doesn't go easy on you. I don't like to spar with girls because they really don't seem to "get into it" like the guys do. I am always a bit conscious about hurting them so I go easy on them, but the guys I can really have good contact sparring matches with cause they get into it and block my kicks and kick back hard and I know they can take a bit of pain - they're not afraid to hurt me and I aint afraid to hurt them. Men have more muscle, less fat and tend to be taller - therefore longer legs and greater reach.

Hey Icetuete, I started TKD a few weeks ago for the very same reasons as your friend; to condition me and get me into better shape...like increasing my flexibility etc so that I'll be better equiped for some of the more aggressive martial arts that I wanna do. I wanna get my black belt in TDK first but then I wanna do mui thai, aikido, BJJ and heaps of other stuff. Basically I wanna do many different styles over my lifetime, and I thought TKD would be the best place to start. And it is. BTW, how do I really tell if my school is a mcdojo? They have gradings every 3 months...so this means if I graded at every opportunity and passed I would get my black belt within 2 years.

No it's not.

Well I wanna be able to kick high enough to knock people out, and some people are tall, so I need to kick real high. I just thought that the splits is the ultimate measure of flexibility, so it's a goal of mine to be able to do them. If I was flexible enough to do the splits then I'd be able to kick as high as is physically possible for me. I also reckon being able to walk on your hands is a great test of strength and balance for your ENTIRE body, not just upper body. So i've been practicing that every day for about a month or so and i'm almost adept at it. I don't know what type of taekwondo it is. By the way John G I live in Western Australia too.

Hey people, I started coming to these boards a few weeks ago after a friend told me about them. I am a newbie to MA but i'm starting taekwondo this week and i'm only 18 years old so I have plenty of time to get good. I just need to know a few things; What is kata? I noticed that Bruce Lee used to make these little squeeky chicken noises when he fought. Did he do this because it actually helps him to fight or focus or something? A friend told me something about how if you make the noises at certain frequencies it can help you punch harder or something. Was Bruce Lee a cocky arrogant kind of guy who just wanted to beat everyone up? Is it true that the Martial Art "Aikido" is taught like a complete religion and has lots of theory involved? What is the best martial arts movie? How long would it take to get really flexible so you can do high side kicks. Can any of you do the splits? Are most karate and taekwondo classes really just "Macdojo's" that wont make you very good, but make you pay a lot of money to get your belts?

The helicopter kicks from streetfighter are possible. Van Damme does them in them movie "kickboxer".

Jean Claude Van Damme is the greatest martial artist ever but Bruce Lee is probably second.

Jean Claude Van Damme