mattyj

your joking right? :| lol @ 'metric time' comment!

yea sam's right. cross step in a 'hopping' motion... next most powerful for me is without the hop, just cross step...

mmm... nah why is sport taekwondo so popular? its sure not because of its effectiveness

I dont think you can really make a definitive 'top 10' of most effective because there is too much variance between instructors/method of training/individual student/application. Ones that i have seen work or seen that they would work (by sparring against/training with/watching a practitioner) ive listed... no particular order... 1. Muay Thai 2. BJJ 3. Kyokyoshin Karate 4. Seido Karate 5. Hapkido/Daito Ryu Aiki Jutsu 6. Boxing 7. Kickboxing 8. Judo 9. Kempo 10. TRADITIONAL korean kwan arts, TRADITIONAL taekwondo. (emphasis on traditional - this depends on instructor/student, i have no faith in any kind of high/flying kicks in street application)

skipping side kick for me

i would hardly say itf is sport orientated? being the original tkd and rooting from the 'traditional' arts of shotokan and taekyon itd be one of the most traditional... atleast at the school i go to.. anyway, on topic, tkd (sport tkd) has become so commercial thats its all about flashy kicks that are ineffective in a street situation

one year from 6th to 7th dan?

tournaments: both. legs have better distance and more power potential... hands are quicker (whatever anyone says) and you dont have to be on one leg to perform them... combinations! street: mainly hands... becos of the close up nature... hands are more versatile and quick... legs for leg kicks/knees/occasionally stomach/groin kicks... IMO

Jake the Mus may be a fictional charactor but I have met, known and hung out with many guys just like him. In fact I can think on 3 just like him in the street where I grew up. That movie was filmed 2 miles away from where my parents live and where I grew up in a suburb called Otara. The warrior spirit lives on in many Maori and when mixed with alcohol has disastrous effects. However I have found that when they get over age 30 or so, they tend to calm down and live differently. It can be quite frightening for people that are not used to people like that, but I grew up with them and its kinda normal for me. In the end they have self image problems and express their frustrations in life through crime and violence. someone else from nz! yea the maori people have somewhat of a 'warrior' culture.. unfortunately as you said this comes out in bad ways all too often with crime etc... did you see that thing on 60 minutes (i think) on the 'anger' culture of the maori anonymous? interesting... just two weeks ago a freind of mine was walking through albert park at night (stupid thing to do... but still this is no excuse) and said 'hows your night?' to a group of around 12 maori people, they didnt say anything, and as he moved on, they followed him, caught up, starting kicking him in the face etc, he woke up in a&e with a few of his mates that were there and saw 2 of the people that had attacked him that were also in a&e (his mates fought back), and has permanent damage to his vision in one eye (for a week they thought hed need a titanium plate somewhere around his eye socket). Senseless? I think so... but anyone trying to adress such problems is labelled 'racist' here in nz...

yea but dont u think camo is getting there?

well they arent the be all and end of all of the quality of instruction etc... but a club using pink and christmas coloured belts is more likely to be of a mcdojo nature...

agreed.

Ours has the camo belt (ATA). Our belt ranks progress White, orange, yellow, camo (First point at which they can free spar with pads), green, purple, blue, brown, red, red/black (Which is 1st degree recommended), and black (1st degree decided.) Aodhan camo? geez... we just use a basic system (which is universal in itf) White Yellow Green Blue Red Black with one stripe in between each belt that is the colour of the next one eg white belt - yellow stripe.

well tkd was invented by a man trained in shotokan karate (general choi), and this is where is draws most of its roots from... so it kinda makes sense? in itf we call jumping 'flying' i dont see how its a 'basic' technique... someone that trains for 6 months will seldom be able to apply a jumping front kick in a way that is advantageous... theyd get screwed up... infact only very gifted students/black belts can apply jumping kicks in an effective way in a real situation... in itf we are invited to try (dependant on club) jumping kicks at a green belt level, but they dont appear in forms until chongmoo (the black stripe (pre black belt) pattern) IMO only at this stage you can have a firm grasp on how to apply this kick in a real situation (and even then... only really in sparring) im not trying to attack the ATA system i just dont think at 6 months training someone is ready to learn 'flashy' stuff like a jumping kick...

yea dont the ata forms have flying kicks really early on? imo most students of earlier levels arent ready for that...