Shotokan stepping side kick versus TKD stepping side kick

[Sideburns]

Coming from a background in TKD, when I briefly trained in Shotokan, I really disliked its stepping side. I preferred the TKD stepping side kick because I could generate much more power. Getting used to a different way of performing one of my favorite kicks was difficult. Anyone else feel the same?

[Wastelander]

Coming from a background in TKD, when I briefly trained in Shotokan, I really disliked its stepping side. I preferred the TKD stepping side kick because I could generate much more power. Getting used to a different way of performing one of my favorite kicks was difficult. Anyone else feel the same?

Would you mind describing these different stepping methods? As it stands I do not have much exposure to TKD but I have been taught a few different ways to step for my side kicks and there are only so many ways that the body can move effectively. If you could give descriptions, videos or step-by-step photos to go off of it would be helpful. Thanks!

[Sideburns]

For example, I was initially taught to use a stepping side kick in TKD from a horse riding stance. If I were to strike using my left leg, my body would be bladed toward the target with my left leg in front. I would then step with my right leg crossing BEHIND my left leg, chamber my left leg and then thrust at the target. The Shotokan method was essentially the same, except I was instructed to cross IN FRONT OF my kicking leg. This felt awkward and I never really got the knack for it. Consequently, when I sparred in Shotokan, I fell back on my previous training.

[MasterPain]

Crossing in front is no good.

There are a few good ways to throw a side kick, and that is not one of them.

[Sideburns]

Tell me about it. Sometimes it felt like I was going to tear my knee up. However, that was probably my only complaint about a particular Shotokan technique. Is it safe to assume that this way a performing a side kick is common among Japanese/Okinawan karate styles or just Shotokan in particular?

[ps1]

I studied shotokan for several years and was never taught to step in front. That hinders your ability to chamber.

[joesteph]

In Duk Sung Son's Korean Karate, there are photos (p. 50) of GM Son performing a side stretch kick, not a side kick with step. I consider it an exercise from reading the text. The book was published in 1968, and when I took his style of karate in the late 80s, it was taught as the way to do the side kick with step. A friend who knew Isshinryu taught me to do that kick with the stepping leg behind. When I studied Soo Bahk Do, the kick is executed with the stepping leg behind.

The only problem I can see with the stepping leg being behind the kicking leg is that someone might turn it into more of a back kick than a side kick. That's why we have instructors and lots of practice.

[Kodiak]

Trying this, I have no real problem going into a front crossover side kick, no torque on my knee at all. It's slower but more powerful than how I do a stepping sidekick now (no crossover, bring the rear foot up to meet the kicking foot). I'm doing it from a neutral bow stance though (haven't kicked out of a horse stance since I quit TKD a decade and a half ago), the different stance could be it.

Edit: I feel old.

Edited July 31, 2011 by Kodiak

[Wastelander]

I have trained two different styles of karate--Shuri-Ryu and Shorin-Ryu--and in both I have been taught to do a stepping side kick by stepping behind my kicking leg. This method is going to be both faster and more powerful then stepping in front because it allows for smoother chambering of the knee to launch the kick. I will say that stepping in front can make it FEEL more powerful because you have to draw the leg back further, but that is just a sensory illusion because you will be bringing the knee back just as far either way but when you step in front you will have lost some of your momentum by the time you can launch the kick.

[DWx]

In TKD, couple of different ways to do it. Any side or half-facing stance will work, so the horse stance, L- or parallel stance can be used (amongst others). Almost always step behind or on rarer occasions, foot-to-foot.

Front crossover just doesn't work so well because you get your legs tangled up as you try to chamber and it hinders your hip probably the cause of your knee pain.

Are you sure its a Shotokan thing? as opposed to an individual school thing?