DWx

Near the back of Gen. Choi's Taekwon-Do (page 753 of the 2004 edition) there is a picture of the Gen. shaking someone's hand and the writing by the side refers to a "Master Oyama". It does kinda look like Mas Oyama so I did a google search and there are quite a few bits and pieces of Mas Oyama and the Gen / ITF. http://www.lacancha.com/oyama.html I've not really known of his connection to TKD before and can't really find much on the web. Anybody know any more about this and what, if any, influence he had on ITF and what influence he took back to Kyokushin?

What do you guys think about blinking? I think that was the main issue I had with this drill as forcing yourself not to blink when you need to will just cause your more problems because you wont be able to see properly.

What are all your opinions on eye contact during a fight? I have recently moved so am training at a new school and one of the things the instructor did with us last session was try to stare us all down. Apparently if we broke eye contact, changed expression or blinked, we'd all be "dead". To be honest I don't really agree with the whole not breaking eye contact thing. For one, I don't tend to focus on the eyes too much during a fight in any case. I prefer to centre on the neck and upper chest area as I like to rely on my peripheral vision and I think looking at the eyes only is a bit limiting. Secondly as long as my expression doesn't reveal my intentions then who cares what I look like. I would have thought such things like pretending to be afraid or really unafraid could pose advantages at times and trying to maintain the blank look is more effort than its worth. With regards to blinking I'd rather not fight my natural instincts as blinking is there for a reason, to rehydrate the eyes and remove any irritants. And if somebody could attack me within the fraction of a second it takes to blink I'd be screwed in any case because there is no way I can react that fast. Obviously I think the whole learning to stare the other person out isn't that beneficial but what's everyone else's opinion on this? Anybody do practice similar to this in their classes?

I think 6 months would be quite a turnoff, I appreciate the idea behind it but in reality you are bound to pay for 6 months of training whether you like it or not. Just a question ironsifu, what if someone in a situation like myself (uni student) trains whilst at uni (or somewhere else) and would like to supplement this with further training when they come home in the holidays. Would you let them spread the 6 months across a longer period so like they do a month in December and a couple of months in the summer, or would they have to pay for the whole six months when they would only train for one?

Welcome!

Welcome!

At my home club classes are around 30 people but you have to specifically sign up for whichever classes you want to attend so we never really get too crowded as there is a limit on numbers. With things that we need more room for or if there is too many, we just take it in turns to do the stuff so have half the class up and half sitting down. Sometimes its good to just sit there and look at what others are doing and suggest corrections / pick up on things you can improve on yourself.

TKD has a lot of self defense. It just depends on who teaches you and what their focus is. And it isn't really all just legs... at least in the style I study, I woul say its more a 60/40 split towards hands with regards to the number of techniques of hand and foot and what you find in the forms. Plus the reasoning behind the legs is that they are longer and more powerful.. thats just how TKD does things. If you want TKD self defense, try searching for "Hosin Sul". I've always found anything by the ITF NK demo team to be quite good. (SD at 1:29, 3:05, 5:23, 7:54 & 8:50)

Welcome!

Just sticking up for TKD here... Like ninjanurse and tallgeese said, compared to other MA, TKD is probably the most popular and well known so although there are a lot of poor standard blackbelts, proportionally-wise it may not be as bad as it seems. And as for high and flying kicks, I have mixed feelings about this. I think they can work for some people but not for everyone and you shouldn't really rely on them too much. From personal experience, I have been on the receiving end of a flying roundhouse which came out of nowhere from a kid who is about 6 inches shorter than me and about a 1/3 of my body weight. The kick totally stunned me and I was wearing a headguard at the time and he had foot pads on. These types of kicks can work but you have to be able to use them competently and have to use them at the right moment to have the proper effect.

That actually looks pretty good. I don't know how useful that would be for anything other than Law Enforcement type professions but it would definately be cool to study. I guess Martial Arts are kinda an all rounder subject in that you'd get to study some history, philosophy, probably some religion and all the physical aspect too. Great that you've found what you want to do too

On the subject of ATMs, one of the pieces of advice was to just cancel what you're doing if you think someone is watching you. Then go off for a bit and maybe come back if you still need the cash.

That's a pretty cool gesture. Yeah it was. They also really embaressed me by giving a speech to the class about me and have threatened to put loads of old photos from when I just started training on their website.

An angry hormonal sibling works much better. Mine actually means it when she takes a swing at me! I get loads of "real" practice.

I've just started uni and obviously have had thousands of leaflets for all sorts of things given to me. I was looking through this personal safety one and there are some good tips in there that some of you guys might like: - Carry a "dummy" wallet as well as your real wallet so that if you get mugged you can hand over a small purse with only a few coins in it. - When using a payphone, turn outwards so you face the street and can look at everything and everyone. - Don't carry a laptop around in a laptop bag, carry it in something like a normal rucksack so theives don't think you've got anything Haven't read through the rest of the leaflets yet but I'll post more tips if I come across any good ones. Anyone else got any other general safety/SD advice?

My Dad didn't really teach me much physically.. he did take me to my first TKD lesson and got me started in MA though. Once piece of advice he gave me when I was younger was to always go for the biggest guy if I were attacked by a group because you'd scare off the rest of the gang. I don't really know how sensible that advice is now but it did work for me when I was about 8 and was being harassed by a group of 13/14 year olds on bikes.

If it's the same as I'm thinking of, I had bought what I called a "screamer" for an uncle of mine, as he was a man who walked everywhere, but was now older and, due to a health condition, could not possibly call for help. My concern was that he'd fall or have a health issue and be unable to cry out. He's since passed away, but the device was really a two-handed one, meaning, if at night and concerned about being attacked, you're likely walking along with your key chain in your hand, and the "screamer" attached. You're probably thinking about the same thing. The one I was given emits a 130 decibel beeping and you use them to scare the attacker and attract attention. When I say two handed, its like on a key chain and you can quite easily carry it in the palm of your hand, its just that to set it off you have to pull out this pin and ideally you need two hands to do it. I'm just thinking of a situation where say you were grabbed with one arm, its kinda hard to work the pin out to set the alarm off with just one hand. Campus security is pretty good. There's always loads of people about at night anyway.. its actually kinda weird when you come back to halls at like 3 am and there are people just going about their buisness normally. I'm not sure what the rules are on pepper spray type things. I would have to check on that one...

Congrats!

I've been ITF since I started training when I was 10. However our club has been in two different ITFs since the split in 2002. The University club I'm looking at joining though is kinda a breakaway style as it is based on the ITF system and does most things like the ITF but with a few changes.

I have a new favourite moment The whole time I've been training in TKD I've only had one dojang and one instructor. Last Thursday was my last session after 8 years as I have now moved away to uni.. At the end of the session, my instructor and his wife gave me a book, Taekwon-Do by Gen. Choi Hong Hi, and they and our main assistant instructor had signed it and people had written messages inside the front cover.

We were given them as freebies this week at uni but to be honest I don't think I ever would carry it with me. Practicality-wise you really need to be holding it in your hand if you were getting attacked and the one I was given really needs two hands to set it off. Does anybody here actually carry them? Anybody ever had to use one?

It sounds to like you might take sword arts as an example. I think that you are right here. Its hard to argue the practicality of using sword combat today, unless you can actually carry a sword now and then. Most weapon styles are a good example. How often do you get to carry around a 6ft spear or a bow and arrows? I'm sure with all weapons styles there are possibilities for empty hand techniques or of finding a something like a stick for SD but to be honest, if SD is what you are looking for, you'd be better off finding an empty hand style or a style with weapons you could feasibly carry. But IMO, they are still Martial Arts styles. The other thing is, what if a style was originally created for the battlefield? Something that takes into account armour, weaponary, whole armies instead of individuals etc. might not translate that well to SD.

Just adding my 2 cents after reading the above posts.. I agree with everyone who said that to be a Martial Art a style has to relate in some way to combat or aspects of combat. However I try not to get too hung up on the idea that Martial Art necessarily equates self defense. Combat yes but not specifically SD. IMO a school does not have to teach SD or methods appropriate to modern combat to still be a Martial Arts school. If they are passing down and preserving these arts that were once used martially, then, in my opinion, they are still MA schools. As long as they don't claim to teach self defense when they really don't, I see nothing wrong with placing a school / style under the MA umbrella even if they aren't really that combat effective anymore.

Welcome!

This was supposed to be showing at the local cinema and a load of us from my dojang were going to see it. Really disappointed as it was cancelled for some reason.