high kicks in a fight

[dear john]

in tae kwon do I have about 9 different instructors and they all have different takes on the subject.

 

I had one instructor that told me to ignore the other instructors and to never try and kick somebody in the head during a fight.

 

but i have this one instructor that makes me really angry. all the time she talks about kicking high and doing the best we can with these high kick, but it seems lik she forgets technique. most of the time if you kick the highest that you can, then youe technique tends to go away. but she insists on focusing on it in every class that she is teaching.

 

the instructor that says no high kicks is a second degree and is old, more experienced in the fighting world.

 

the instructor that says high kicks are good is a third degree and is only about 18 or 19 years old and i dont think she has ever been in a fight.

 

and then there are the instructors in between.

 

who do you think i should leen towards?

 

idont want to make a bad decision

[G95champ]

High kicks in a real fight are bad for these reasons.

 

1. The head is a small target

 

2. You are not lose usually

 

3. You have on tight on unconfortable clothes that restrick you ability to kick much less high.

 

4. The groud is not stable. You may be in slick grass or on on a wet street.

 

5. Too slow and the person can counter.

 

6. Althought the reward of landing a head kick is huge if you miss your in troulbe because you are going down.

 

In the dojo I have no prob. with high kicks but in the street IMO they will get you beat, hurt or killed.

[Shorinryu Sensei]

I had one instructor that told me to ignore the other instructors and to never try and kick somebody in the head during a fight.

 

You need to listen to ALL of your instructors, but this guy is the one to believe!

 

High kicks look great, but are a good way to get neutered if you're fighting an opponent, such as myself, that loves an exposed groin in a fight. Plus think about your balance while your foot is way up there in the air. How is it? Pretty bad of course, so you may just end up on the floor. How's your ground fighting capability?

 

All instructors in the same dojo/dojang need to be consistent with each other. One shouldn't teach that "this is right", and another teach the opposite. It doesn't instill confidence in them, and can cause arguments and conflict in the class..which is what is hppening with you right now.

[Vito]

9 instructors? kick the head in a real fight? instructors are 18, 19? my honest to god advice to you, if youre concerned with real fighting, is to leave that place (certainly a mcdojo- tkd rarely has any real fight skills taught anyway) and find a muay thai gym.

[Ravencroft]

I personally havent been in too many fights myself so i cant be sure but i can speak from my own experiences. one of the only fights i ever got in(it was also the most recent) i used a high sidekick to the head and nailed him. i think he was a boxer cuz he was fighting like one. the funny thing was eventhough i did it real fast he did attempt to make a very sloppy punch in that split second towards my waist area. it didnt work because i used a block that from what ive seen most TKD schools dont emphasize... blocking ur damn crotch. of course u will get crucified if u open ur crotch up like that but if u block its not really a problem. kicks can work amazingly in a fight as good as anything else, they just need to be practiced and used somewhat conservitavely. but like i said im not someone who has a bunch of fighting experience its just what happened to me.

[Shorinryu Sensei]

I personally havent been in too many fights myself so i cant be sure but i can speak from my own experiences. one of the only fights i ever got in(it was also the most recent) i used a high sidekick to the head and nailed him. i think he was a boxer cuz he was fighting like one. the funny thing was eventhough i did it real fast he did attempt to make a very sloppy punch in that split second towards my waist area. it didnt work because i used a block that from what ive seen most TKD schools dont emphasize... blocking ur damn crotch. of course u will get crucified if u open ur crotch up like that but if u block its not really a problem. kicks can work amazingly in a fight as good as anything else, they just need to be practiced and used somewhat conservitavely. but like i said im not someone who has a bunch of fighting experience its just what happened to me.

 

Trust me. If you used a head kick successfully in a real fight. you were:

 

1. Really lucky it worked.

 

2. fighting an inexpperienced fighter, regardless of if he looked like a boxer or not.

 

Also, the groin block you are mentioning is very limited as to what protection it will give you. There are basically only two ways to block the groin with your hand. A fist with knuckles pointing downward, or the flat of the hand pointing downward. Both will only stop a upward direction roundhouse type of kick, but will not prevernt a, upward kick with the ball of the foot. The roundhouse groin kick will hurt, the ball of the foot method will smash. BIG differance.

[Sasori_Te]

I'm going to have to go with ShorinRyu Sensei here. Even if you're a naturally good kicker (I'm not, I work my butt off) you end up relying on luck more than skill if you use a high kick in a street fight.

 

You also forgot to mention that even successfuly blocking the groin with the methods you mentioned you can sustain serious injury to the hand.

[wing chun kuen man]

Your 19 year old 3rd dan instructor who likes the high kicks knows more about John Claude Van Damm movies than about real fighting. She is probably a great fan of his. You should only "lean" towards her if she is a hot babe, otherwise you better lean towards the EXIT.

 

Like Vito said, this place sounds like a Mcdojo/dojang. And if you want to learn real fighting and you cannot find a good TKD dojo then I would suggest a traditional karate dojo would be more appealing to you as a TKD practitioner than many other styles. Try Shorin-Ryu, Goju-Ryu or Kyokushinkai. There are other good styles of karate as well, but the above styles are a good place to start. If you find a good, authentic school teaching any of the above styles then give it a try.

 

Just a note. A third dan 19 year old in any martial arts school is a red signal.

 

A quick word about high kicks. If you are really good at them they may even work in some street situations. It is my experience that sometimes during confrontations the parties involved expect fist attacks rather than kicks, specially high ones. Sometimes it is possible to land a high kick into someones face as they are threatening to attack you and are closing/rushing in for fist fighting distance. You can also use high kicks on opponents who are "out on their feet" from a previous hand technique, to help them onto the floor.

 

Having said that I will stress that high kicks are not necessary and most of the time irrelevant and are also risky in a real fight as sometimes you don´t know how experienced your opponent is,or wether he is a martial artist himself.

 

We don´t really use high kicks in Wing Chun for reasons many of which have been posted in this thread. Using high kicks against many kung fu stylists you are not only risking to have your testicles kicked but also have them torn out by claw techniques.

 

Anyway, if you stay in your school then I would suggest that you listen to the older instructor. If you don´t (I recommend that you seriously look into other schools as mentioned above), then good luck in finding a more authentic martial arts school.

 

Wing Chun Kuen Man

[SevenStar]

High kicks in a real fight are bad for these reasons.

 

1. The head is a small target

 

2. You are not lose usually

 

3. You have on tight on unconfortable clothes that restrick you ability to kick much less high.

 

4. The groud is not stable. You may be in slick grass or on on a wet street.

 

5. Too slow and the person can counter.

 

6. Althought the reward of landing a head kick is huge if you miss your in troulbe because you are going down.

 

In the dojo I have no prob. with high kicks but in the street IMO they will get you beat, hurt or killed.

 

I think you're on the right track, but some of your reasons are wrong:

 

1. correct.

 

2. Depends on the person - I can kick head height at any given time with no warm up.

 

3. depends on the person. I never wear tight clothes.

 

4. has some validity to it.

 

5 A good head kicker can kick to the head pretty rapidly. It's not THAT slow.

 

The main reason, IMO, which you didn't state is that your balance is compromised. with your leg that high in the air, you are off balance and easy to take down. Also, even though the kick itself may be fast, the recovery time is slower.

[G95champ]

Well my 6th point was a referance to balance and being countered so yeah I agree with that point. The 5th sort of refers to balance as well.

 

The points I listed are not always true nothing is for that matter but I think we can agree they are basically true for everyone. Most of us wear blue jeans, a lot of us wear shoes like sandles, boots, dress shoes that makes kicking and balance hard.

 

Again I agree with what you said that some people are the exceptions not the rule. Nothing in any thing is ever 100% true but I think those 6 points I made are pretty close.