Blocking while sparring?

[Miles]

Miles, what about WTK Taekwondo where the body shots are judged on impact and you can win by knock out. The whole intent there is to injury, hurt or put the other player out of commission so that they can not continue. It is not a case of assault and battery it is 2 players fighting full contact TKD. If you put a touch football player in a game with players wearing pads and used to hitting are they then wrong to nail the touch foot ball player who wants to play with them? No, they are just playing under different rules, the same as in the martial arts. If the full contact players went to a non/light contact tournament and went all out then he would be wrong but in WTF TKD if you are not hitting with the intent to injure (within the context of the rules that govern WTF TKD) then you are not playing the game the way it should be played and you really need to go somewhere else that is a safer place to play. This is just my opinion, of course.

Wade, I think I understand where you are coming from, but in sparring, there is what we lawyers call "assumption of risk." There is no intent to injure, but there is an understanding that due to the nature of the activity, that someone could get knocked out (heck, there was that Dutch player who died a few years back). As you mention, the play is within the context of the rules-I still think that you can play to win without the intent to injure (which if you have that intent, there is no respect for your opponent).

I am not talking about hard blocking (which I totally believe in and teach). I am thinking more like using a cut kick to the opponent's knee-something that is clearly not allowed under the rules.

Sean, if we agree to disagree that is fine, I wanted to understand your point as we may be coming at this from different perspectives.

Miles

 

[wade]

Thank you miles, I did misunderstood your meaning. When I say "intent" to injure I am talking about staying within the rules of the competition. I agree, when a person goes outside the rules then the idea of fair play is gone. Right now I have a 14 year old female blue belt, she is on her high school varsity TKD team and she has won her last 3 tournament with TKO's, BUT!, she did them all within the rules of the competition. Two wins were with body shots and one with head shots, all were legal where she was playing. There is a difference. I trust this young lady implicitly with my younger students because she has such great control and a great attitude with children.

 

[tshadowchaser]

So the question is do people try and block while sparring?

I'll admit to not reading all of the answeres but I must say that personaly I have always found that my head and ribs felt better after sparring if I at least tried to block

 

[Miles]

Right now I have a 14 year old female blue belt, she is on her high school varsity TKD team and she has won her last 3 tournament with TKO's.

OT thread alert!!!!

Wow, Wade, how cool is that? I investigated getting the idea of having TKD become a high school sport to the Michigan High School Athletic Association and was told a certain number of high schools had to participate (it was a pretty high percentage) in order to make it work. Unfortunately, I don't have that many friends teaching TKD. Congratulations to you and your student!

Miles

 

[wade]

Thanks Miles. After a year of very hard work I was able to push it through the school board on 15 July 96 in Scappoose, Or. It was mentioned in Taekwondo Times Dec 96 issue. Sara Lewis received the first of many Varsity Letters at the Fall Sports Banquet with the rest of the high school athletes. The biggest problem was convincing them that WTF full contact sparring was not fighting but a legitimate Olympic sport.