WTF Taekwondo is THE awesome!

Spot on.

A good WTF roundhouse kick hurts more than you'd think from watching a YouTube video. Trust me. Even with a hogu on my chest and a pad on the other person's instep and shin, I've had the wind knocked clean out of me with a single kick.

And yes, there's a lot more depth to the sport than its haters realize. Would it really have become an Olympic sport if there was no complexity, no strategy, and no talent required?

 

the scoring criteria they train for endorses only what is effective.

That's not entirely true though is it?
It's well known that Thai bouts in Thailand are scored with a preference for the unpadded weapons (knees, elbows). They also score throws highly I think.
And yet I'd agrue that if you want "effective" then punching is the most effective thing to do.
Note I'm not saying that elbows and knees are not effective (they clearly are). Just that encouraging them over punching is not a scoring criteria based on effectiveness. There's more than a little cultural bias in Thai scoring.

 

Actually it's completely true. It's a myth, even amongst western thai boxers, that boxing doesn't score. The difference is that in thailand they only score individual techniques that are shown to have an ACTUAL effect. A cleacn kick that lands on the ribs but has no clear effect doesn't score. For this reason, it's very hard to score boxing. I was taught how to judge by Tony Myers, the UKs leading judge - he spends most of the year in thailand and as far as I'm aware, is a regular guest judge at Lumpinee. I remember someone in the judging class ASKING abotu what scores highest and Tony showed us a clip of him talking with the Lumpinee stadium head judge and was told that neither a kick, a punch, a knee or an elbow outscores the other automatically - it's all based on effect. Only if absolutely everything else is equal, do they then judge it based on who has the "nicest" thai style. Which usually means kicks.

You just have to look at fighters like Bovy and Anuwat to see proof of how punching is effectively scored under thai rules. As far as I'm aware Anuwat is currently ranked no. 1 in thailand at his weight category and his nickname is "the Iron Hands of Siam". Epic.

 

This has pretty much been my point the entire time, but haters gonna hate.

 

Im not saying use MT im saying do what ever you do but dont say its MT or like it.It isnt. Its TKD using its knees ,elbows or what ever. I think thats great.
For me personaly thats a not my route as it feels too slow an approach when I can just get the answers from MT or wrestling or MMA rather than come to the same conclusions but taking time and alot of trial and error.

I dont believe practicaly they did originaly whats being done today (Like Kudo) yet in theory they meant it to be like that. But that debates been done lol and imnot knocking taking that approach. Its good for TKD.

 

I might should clarify what I meant when I said "TKD is MT . . . but a whole lot more." Obviously the styles are different. I was referring to the fact that, for the most part, the techniques are all there in TKD that are in MT. This is certainly true for the most commonly used techniques.

 

Show me how you throw a roundhouse, then I'l lteach you how a roundhouse should be thrown in a fight.

Show me how you throw a knee and I'll do the same.

Show me how you throw an elbow and I'll do it again.

If you don't train something, then you don't have it it's that simple. So you do a knee in a pattern? Doesn't mean you "do" elbows. If Mitch trains his guys in elbows and knees then he can say he has elbows. 99% of the TKD world can't. Every kick you can thinnk of in TKD I'll guarantee there's a name for it in Thai. Do they use them? No. Since they don't use them, as their application is usually a very high risk, do they train them? Again, no. If you wanna start going down all these metaphysicaly routes about what the differences are between the arts then I tell you there isn't one. Just what you train and how. But honestly, I don't buy into all that philosophy crap, nobody ever won a fight by philosophising about it.

 

More than once you've questioned my knowledge in this thread, which I've mostly let go, but I'm going to clearly state that I know how to throw an MT roundhouse and a TKD roundhouse and I know the difference. In fact, my MT instructor told me that I had a "natural kick" and that's the truth. He just didn't know that I was already familiar with how to throw an MT roundhouse because of prior exposure.

You can believe what you want, but the fact that you won't even listen to anything I have to say is the reason I basically stopped responding in the first place. If you want to have a discussion, we can discuss. But if you want to insult me and basically call me a liar and argue, then I can go to Bullshido for that. That's not why I'm a MAP member.

Regarding your statement: "If you don't train something, then you don't have it it's that simple. So you do a knee in a pattern? Doesn't mean you "do" elbows. If Mitch trains his guys in elbows and knees then he can say he has elbows". . .

What I said EXACTLY earlier in the thread was that the techniques are there, you just have to train them. I then confirmed--both in this thread and in others--that most TKD schools do NOT train these techniques. But the techniques are in the curriculum, so the art has them, you just have to train them. Train to fight and you'll learn to fight.

So now basically you're agreeing with what I said earlier. Why couldn't you just do it earlier and leave it at that? Why attack my position with strawman arguments regarding points that I wasn't even making? You seem to have some issue with my credibility, probably due to the fact that I'm new to MAP, but don't make the mistake of thinking that everyone who is involved in martial arts also has a MAP account.

 

Actually, it just seems that with every posts you change what you were apparently saying just a little bit. You're the one who really brought Muay Thai into this. I was using it as a comparison for the subject at hand. You turned this into a versus post and for the last time, I'm asking you to stop talking about it. With regards to your muay thia knowledge etc. as I've previously stated, I've seen how long it takes some people with a lot of dedication, hard work and good coaching to actually learn how to do a thai kick. Since you've shown your actual knowledge of muay thai to be about Jean Claude Van Damme level then I think we can all safely agree that it's a fair bet your thai roundhouse isn't what you think it is either. If you want educated on thai boxing, ome to the thai boxing forum, I'm sure myself and a few others will have a ball educating you - just try to keep it on topic on this thread please.

 

Okay, it's obvious at this point that you're just trolling me.

Dude, that that crap to Sherdog or Bullshido.

 

Mate I've tried time and again to keep it on topic and away from a versus thread. To acuse me of turning this into a bullshido style thread is horse dung! Mitch even very neatly brought the thread back on track and you still managed to bring it back to being all about you and the versus thing.

 

By agreeing with Mitch I somehow sidelined the thread?

I never turned it into a VS thread. How is saying that I've trained some MT and agreeing that MT can teach TKD a lot in any way combative or a knock on MT.

Way back on like page 2 there were comments made about the "combat effectiveness" of TKD and that's where this started. In fact, I think at least some of these comments were made by you, and your rationale was that the TKD rulesets are not great for developing good combat skills.

I agreed with this--though I said ITF was a lot closer than WTF--and basically followed it up with saying, BUT all the techniques for an effective fighting system exist in TKD and if individual schools or individual students choose to train these techniques then the system can be very effective. All it takes is a personal decision to train to use the ENTIRE SYSTEM OF TECHNIQUES, which has nothing to do with the rulesets that official TKD tournaments abide by.

What's controversial about this?

The funny thing about this is I was just having a conversation with my TKD instructor the other day, and I said to him, "If you just want to learn to fight--that's all you want to do, become a good fighter--then you should do MT." There are reasons other than just learning to fight that I'm involved in TKD instead of continuing on at the MT gym. I like patterns. I like breaking. Regardless of the "combat effectiveness" in comparison to MT, TKD sparring is a lot of fun. But I do believe that TKD can be effective . . . IF YOU TRAIN IT TO BE EFFECTIVE.

It also gets old when MT guys try to take shots at TMA styles in any way that they can. I mean, Jesus, you can't even give Machida credit. You talked about how he got "owned," but you don't talk about his 14 fight undefeated win streak before he faced Shogun.

After he got KOd, so many people were like:

MT > Shotokan

Oh? Well then how about after Machida KOd Thiago Silva, does that mean:

Shotokan > MT?

You see how that works?

The truth is that I myself had almost given up on TMA styles before Machida. But I had a real "I'll be damned" moment after I saw him fight, because not only does he have a background in the style, but when you watch him you can SEE Shotokan in the way he moves. Plenty of MMA guys have TMA backgrounds, but you can't really see it when they fight. With him, you can.

So I looked into TKD MMA fighters. You have guys like Dan Hardy, but he's one of those guys who you can't tell he studied TKD, so he's kind of an irrelevant example. But then I found guys like Lukasz Jurkowski, an MMA fighter who has had some pretty solid success, and when you watch him you can say, "Yes, that's TKD," all the way from his straightforward alternating punches to his kicks.

I knew then that it all comes down to how you train. If you can figure out how to use TKD correctly, as Lukasz has, then you will be a good fighter. If you learn to use Shotokan correctly, as Machida has, then the same applies. (Disclaimer: To be complete you will have to learn to grapple to.) I mean, hell, I can point to a fight with an ATA TKD guy (of all things) beating an MT guy and winning a belt. I'm sure you'll interpret me even bring that up as a style VS style thing, but it's not about being anti-MT, it's about saying TKD can hang with best of them if you have someone who knows what they're doing.

 

Ok right at the start you got it wrong. this thread isn't about TKD. It's about WTF TKD. And that, clearly is what I was referring to - oh and by the way it wasnt even me who started talking about "combat effectiveness". That's right, go back and read it.... see?

This whole comment is just riddled with all that Muay thai versus TKD crap. At no point in this thread did I take a pot shot at TKD. So if you're going to put words in my mouth and acuse me of saying things that there's a written record of me NOT saying ,then I think I'm done talking to you. Everyone reading this thread can go back and see exactly what I've said - they don't need you to try and quote me saying things out of context, or, in the absence of an actual quote, you just make it up. I never brought up a single fight where I spoke about a style versus style - but you've interpretted everything I say as an insult to your chosen "art". I tihnk largely because I train in muay thai and make no secret of that when I mention it a lot when comparing positive and negative aspects of another martial art. Get it through your head mate - that's not a versus or a challenge or a dis or anything - thats a comparison with the art I know best.

None of my comments were offensive, or at least, I think it's obvious that if therre are some, that they're not intentionally offensive. You, however, have reacted defensively every step of the way. I suggest you go back to the start of the thread and read through it slowly. And try to keep in mind what the actual topic is about when you do so.

 

Master Betty,

Let me ask you this:

Do you agree that, in trained for combat effectiveness, TKD can be a combat effective martial art?

If you say yes, then you're simply agreeing with what I've said the entire time. If you say no, then I'd like to know why, especially in light of full contact fighters who has been able to use it effectively.

Knowing you, though, you'll probably choose some third option because you're a master at dancing around anything anyone says and not actually answering specific points someone makes.

Either way, though, I congratulate you on your trolling skills. They're pretty solid.

 

I think, if you'd taken my advice and actually read the damn thread agian, you'd see that I've said that many a time. There just seems to be certain things I've said that you either ignore or interpret in a way that nobody who hasn't been smoking the pineapple express can understand.

I say: WTF isn't the awesome, it's a very limited ruleset that is scored in a very unrealistic manner that encourages technique and strategy that is detrimental to any sort of comabt scenario - real or ring. I think TKD would be much benefited by doing something as simple as changing the scoring criteria to reward effect rather than touch, much in the same way that Muay Thai or K1 does.

You hear: TKD SUCKS TKD SUCKS TKD SUCKS HAHAHAHA MUAY THAI RULES TKD SUCKS TKD SUCKS ROFLOLMAO HAHAHA TKD SUCKS.

Now.

Can you see why we're having an issue here. And stop calling me a troll - do you even have any inkling what the phrase actually means or are you as moronic as your previous posts have suggested?

 

Very amusing indeed. Thanks for keeping the thread light-hearted! LMAO

 

The rest of your post was pretty sensible, so there's not much to about it, but. . .

Yeah, I know what troll means. It's someone who does exactly what you've seemed to be doing, and that's just continuing a conversation in a way that's just meant to **** anyone off.

I've done my best not to call you any names or try to insult you, while you've called me a moron and implied that I'm also a liar.

Then I make a post in which I essentially "pour my heart out" regarding my thoughts on the subject, and instead of actually addressing the points I made, you just sidestep it and continue to make the conversation about something it's not.

I like to have conversations about this stuff with people, but only if they can not be so damn cynical and only if they will respect my point of view.

 

I think that the main problem is that the majority of TKD practitioners don't train for 'combat effectiveness' because of the almost constant effort on the extrinsic rewards of grades, trophies and certificates. I am sure that many TKD techniques could / should / would be effective for actual combat if they were trained very differently and with most of the 'rules' removed from training. Difficulty arises because TKD has many children training and so the rules are essential. The restrictions of commercialism, safety and tournament mindset have probably moved TKD further away from its 'martial / combat' roots than most TKD practitioners would like to acknowledge.

SPX Pity a fairly sensible question was ruined by the sarcastic BS aimed at Master B. I guess that some of you guys don't actually 'live' by your tenets, but rather repeat them because 'SIR' tells me to. :woo:

With respect

Peter