Lopez takes fight to taekwondo federation

[bushido_man96]

From Yahoo! Sports: Lopez challenges call concerning a "cut kick" in his match with Italian Mauro Sarmiento. It sounds like politics at work here, but I can't be for sure, since I didn't get to watch the match.

Its strange to see Lopez fighting for the bronze, and not the gold. He had been undefeated in international competition since 2002! But, happens to the best of us.

What will come of this? Is this the last year for TKD in the Olympics?[/url]

[tallgeese]

I don't know if it's the end, but between the controversy and the cuban kicking the ref, the competivive TKD community is taking a beating.

[bushido_man96]

It sure is. If it falls out of the Olympics, its no big deal to me. It won't effect my TKD career at all. And, it will probably still have its international competitions and such. But, if the ITF and WTF do merge, perhaps they can streamline some things and get it back to the world stage.

[Truestar]

I've just recently taken a more in depth look at the art I've practiced for 8 years now so don't mind me asking, do you think the ITF and WTF would ever merge? The history lesson I've gotten is the politics of TKD are so screwed up, it will probably never be unified again.

[bushido_man96]

They have been making efforts through meetings to do so. We'll see if it happens, though. It is unlikely in my eyes that they will come to terms on such a merger, but they are working on it right now.

[tallgeese]

I'm typically a diversity guy, always the one who kind of approves of splits and such. I even argued in another thread about how the Parker systems probibly shouldn't reunite due to stylistic differences atthis point.

However, on this subject I'd agree that unification wouldn't be a bad thing. TKD is a major competive arena around the world. Currently, I think that there are too many splintered organizations to make a cohesive set of regulations and unified titles and such. Given what most of the organizations are trying to do, a merge of two of it's largest would go a long way to accomplishing the goals each have set out. It would probibly put an end to a lot of needless in-fighting between groups that I've seen.

Not being affilated with either it's way easier for me to say than those affected by such actions. It's just an outsiders view.

[DWx]

I'm not too familiar with what Lopez is/was doing, but did he file an appeal? Team GB did and we got Sarah Stevenson back into the games.

On the merger, you have to remember that only one of the ITFs is in talks. The other two have nothing to do with it. I think the 3 ITFs themselves need to sort things out if a proper WTF/ITF merger were to ever happen. I'm personally rather skeptical about the merger as WTF and ITF are just so different. Everything about them is different even down to the fact that WTF is a public org and the ITFs are private. Aside from the fact that they both arose out of the Kwan system and that they both use a lot of legs they are completely different styles of MA with different ways of doing things.

[bushido_man96]

I'm not too familiar with what Lopez is/was doing, but did he file an appeal? Team GB did and we got Sarah Stevenson back into the games.

Lopez and his coach Herb Perez did file an appeal at the Games, but they claimed the they didn't handle the appeal by the book. They were quite upset about it.

As for the merger, it does appear to be a stretch. Perhaps the ITF should make its play now as the official governing body of TKD.

[The BB of C]

I'm going to be seriously PO'ed if Tae Kwon Do gets cut from the Olympacs. That's the only sport I'd follow.

[IcemanSK]

As our collegue DWX has eludded to, the ITF is split into 3 pieces currently. An ITF/WTF merger would most likely be with only one of those groups (although which one, I couldn't guess) & only the one with something to offer the WTF. The WTF is in the "Power seat" in this discussion. If it sees nothing to gain, it will only be talk.