Tae Kwon Do

The First in the world, Ben Evans, pioneer of Special Needs Taekwon-Do, a day in the life of Hawke's Bay ITF Taekwon-Do School. His goal is to take these students to DPR KOREA in 2011, the next ITF Taekwon-Do World Championships

Hi there, everyone. :)

I'm Stephanie, I'm 25, and I just moved from FL to MD just before New Year's Eve. I did Tae Kwon Do as a kid, and was trained by a sa bom nim who conveniently lived around the block from my family. My sister and I used to take classes with his two daughters in his garage for a year or two, then we moved into an actual building and gained two more students. I took these classes between 12 and 16 or so, then quit to focus on my grades and to prepare for college. By the time I quit, I was a striped purple belt.

It's been about 8 years since I've even put on a TKD belt, but I've really wanted to get back into it lately. It's an itch that I just need to scratch. ;) I'm not sure how I'm going to do as it's been so long and I'm quite a bit older, but I'm not letting either of these stop me from at least trying, haha.

So... hi! Just wanted to introduce myself. :) 

Also, does anyone here live in the DC/MD area? I live in central MD, and have found a couple studios here that sound interesting and like the instruction as I got in FL (though not nearly as intimate, obviously, lol), but I'm looking for recommendations. I'll probably do some sit-ins in studios come November or December, so any suggestions would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks!

I quit taekwondo for 2 1/2 years but I came back in February to continue my black belt training. I'm also now an instructor in training and recently went to an instructor certification camp to get my certification for white, orange, and yellow belt information. I'm really glad to be back with all my friends!

Hi guys.

Just wondering if anyone here knows the literal meaning of the word 'kubi' or 'gubi', as in apkubi or dwitkubi stances.

Thanks.

:)

Tuesday night was amazing, I rejoined ITF Taekwon-Do at Horanji Taekwon-Do it's moved to a bigger Dojang then when I last trained, it's really nice, there's a wall between the training area and where the parents sit so less distractions, the ceiling is way higher so they can set up specialty breaking stands, and extra changing rooms.
I'm a green belt, and I've been off for about a year and a half and haven't really done much but gain 20 pounds and not cared too much about my fitness, like I play sports with friends and I'm a pretty hyper guy all around, but that first day back is always brutal, I kept up with everyone else in the warm up, doing laps (25) push-ups (50) sit-ups (50) jumping jacks (50). definitely lost flexibility in warm-up stretches. the rest of class was taken up by practicing patterns I mostly remembered Chun-ji, Dan-Gun, Do-San, but I completely forgot Won-Hyo was even one of my patterns, after being shown it a couple times my body remembered it. Though of course it was sloppy but still good for being away so long.
I made the mistake of eating a big supper, so after class feeling exhausted, I almost threw up and I barely got any sleep.
Man it feels good to be back though, it kind of sucks my one class mate that was the same level as me when I was there has his blue belt with a red stripe, but it just makes me wanna work harder then ever to catch up with him. He was/is one of the toughest guys in our Dojang so I always liked being the same level as him, and sparring with him. I can't wait until class on friday, to see how bad I am at sparring now, hopefully it'll only take a few classes to get back to where I was.
Well all my muscles hurt, and I'm still really tired so I'll sign off.

Hey guys, just another introduction post...

I've just started going back to TaeKwonDo after a four year break. I trained with the ITF under my god-father's teaching when I was very young, but gave up because the school was too far away. When I was in secondary school, I found a school much closer with the ITA and trained until I was sixteen and a senior purple belt. Unfortunately, four nights a week training got in the way of my school work and I began to fail so had to give up completely to save my grades. Now I'm at university, I decided that I wanted to go back and get myself back into it because I had a real passion for it before, and I'm not at another ITF school in Guildford, England.

I'm currently training at blue belt level because my instructor is looking to put me forward in October to grade and go straight from white belt to blue belt, red tag. I know I have plenty of time, but I'm starting to stress myself out about such a huge grading. I seem to have completely lost most of what made me good at TaeKwonDo when I was back in school. My speed's definitely suffered, which was how I won competitions, and my strength and flexibility are both nowhere close to what they were before.

I was wondering if anyone could give me any tips to develop my strength, flexibility and speed outside of lessons so that I can really work hard to get myself back to the level that I was before by the time October comes around.

I got my second degree black belt today! I passed with 60%, and I felt that the grading went well overall.

Just thought I'd share.

http://www.sun-sentinel2.com/featu…

dotar_sojat recently posted:
"training for tournaments and competing in them are the most likely way to get injured"

I'm not trying to refute that statement, but the below information will help put it in perspective.

Database: Injuries reported by emergency rooms

The Consumer Product Safety Commission's National Electronic Injury Surveillance System (NEISS) is a sample of 100 hospital emergency rooms in the United States and its territories. Patient information is collected from NEISS hospitals for every emergency visit involving an injury associated with consumer products. Make no mistake: Many injuries found here are the result of accidents or carelessness and not the fault of the product itself. More than 374,000 injuries were reported in 2008, the latest available year for NEISS data.

Results of keyword search through 374260 records
football 14579
baseball 4042
taekwondo 9
karate 321
skiing 1038
basketball 14443
soccer 6159
wrestling 1483
cheerleading 779
gymnastics 670
golf 1298

I'm in pretty good shape for being **cough** forty**cough** years old.  I've been doing taekwondo since I was 15 and like to think that I'm quite good at it. 

However, I've never been happy with my competition sparring (world taekwondo federation style sparring).  I can do the kicks well, and can keep my hands up (or down, depending), so it isn't like I get clocked or anything.  But since I was 15 I've hardly ever won a competition.  I won't say I never won, because I have, but those matches where two brown belts flail away at each until on egets lucky, those don't really count.   It is as if something very basic is missing from my strategy.  I took special sparring classes back in the day, but again it always seems that some fundamental thing didn't stick.

I did a little sparring at black belt level in the early and mid-90s, but that (if you've ever looked at the age brackets) is a dangerous place to be- 18-35 is one group.  AGain, didn't get just beaten down, but didn't ever win either.  So I got out of it until I was well out of that 18-35 kill zone and now that I'm past that I thought I'd get back into it.

So in December I go to a small local tournament, get stuck with a 16 year old (... so much for the age-brackets) who was quite the competitor.  Didn't get clocked (...although I would have taken a standing eight at one point, had it been offered-- couldn't... inhale!)  and managed to get a sharp roundhouse on his head, but still lost.

Now I'm trying to decide if it would be worth it try to hone my skills in this one area.  Part of it, of course, is the tournament environment itself will drive all but the most deeply ingrained habits/strategies from your mind.  For those who have never been in a tournament, what I'm talking about is that lung-burning, blood-tasting, utterly exhausted state you get in after about a minute (maybe less, maybe more). 

Sparring a complete stranger is a lot harder than sparring one of the people you see every week, or even those people in the extended organization you may go up against every few months or so.   And I think that is where a lot of my problem lies-- after a minute and a half the exhuastion and the stres have pretty much driven most of the strategies out of my mind. 

So I started videoing my matches at my school.  I saw a few things right off that I could improve on (shorter stance, distance control, things like that).  I can work on the stamina and that would help.  I can seek out the people in the organization who are really good and practice with them.

But, and here is the real puzzle, is it worth it?  Because it isn't like this doesn't have risks.  I'm in good shape now, but training for tournaments and competing in them are the most likely way to get injured-- and at this age (... I hate saying that, but there it is), that injury may not go away-- it could lead to having to shelve (or curtail) taekwondo altogether.

Opinions?  Observations?  War stories?