Poomsae Team Trials

[MSUTKD]

Last weekend I had the opportunity to participate in the first US National Poomsae Team Trials in San Diego. This event was to select the first US Poomsae Team for the World Championships in Seoul in Sept.
The WTF and Kukkiwon have standardized the poomsae and we were required to know the new way. Most of us trained for about three months to incorporate the changes into our practice, plus learn any new forms. The format was very tough and was divided by age; 14-17, 18-30, 31-40, 41-50 and 50 and up. What made this fun was the fact that you had to know 8 poomsae for each division; this will be the new standard at competitions in the next few years. The 14-17, 18-30 and 31-40 had to ready to perform Taeguek 6, 7, 8 and Koryo, Kuemgang, Taebaek, Pyongwon and Shipjin, no matter what your rank. The 41-50 division had to do Taeguek 8, Koryo, Kuemgang, Taebaek, Pyongwon and Shipjin, Jitae and Chungkwan. The 51 and up, Kuemgang all the way up to Ilyo. The competition was divided into three rounds, with the lower 50% being eliminated each round. We were prepared to have the poomsae randomly called and perform them but they told us about 30 mins before which one we would do. There were 7 judges who scored us in two categories, technical and performance, with 5 being the highest score per category. Points were taken for a variety of reasons, in technical for doing an incorrect motion and in performance for wrong timing, bad eye motion, etc. These scores were then summed and given.
It was a very hard competition and some of the divisions were so close that it came down to tenth’s of a point. All in all it is an exciting change and I am looking forward to more of the same.

ron

 

[Miles]

Congratulations on your showing at this inaugural event Ron! I checked the results on the NASTO website and your division was extremely close. I knew Master Turgeon was an excellent referee, but he appears to be quite good at Poomsae too.

How did you train for this event and what, if any, influence did the Dartfish DVDs have on your techniques/performance?

Will you change the manner in which you train your students? Your competition team? If so, how?

Miles

 

[terryl965]

Master Southwick what actual differences are there now and did you use the new Kukkiwon info. on the poomse or was it from another source?
What was actually the least favorite thing that can be work on in the next couple of year to help the poomse continue to grow?
I'm so glad you had a great time.
Terry

 

[MSUTKD]

At this competition everyone was good, they better be; it was the team trials. A few people that were not prepared dropped out early. They either did not understand the rules or had not studied the Dartfish information. One very important piece of information gleaned is that Dartfish is NOT the standard we were told it was. The WTF/Kukkiwon has changed the forms again, mostly in the stance. We only got bits of information but they, of course, waited to release this a couple of months before World’s. This gives them a slight chance and is the same thing they did for sparring a few years back. Poomsae in Korea is almost dead, aside from demo teams that show tourist and visiting taekwondoist poomsae, most clubs just learn the forms a couple days before the test. The powerhouse poomsae competitors are from Europe. Europe has had a Technical Championship since 1993 and though they have been not too concerned with standards, they allow some different interpretations, they do amazing poomsae. Europe will follow the standards at the World’s. Here is the best, I believe, poomsae practitioner in the world, Ky-Tu Dang.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w5HrEOykyik&search=poomse

If we want to move forward in this country then study that video link. If your poomsae is getting close to Ky-Tu Dang then you are on your way. For me I trained for three months and was really training to go against Ky-Tu Dang, in hopes that I did make the team. I also studied the 2005 European Technical Championships, which you can find at tkddvd.com.

This does change a few things in our, MSU’s, poomsae practice. We had to make minor modifications to adjust technical discrepancies and of course increase the number of poomsae known by black belt competitors. I am now teaching ALL of the black belt poomsae to our yudanja (dan holders). I only had to learn Chungkwon but two of my students who competed were only 1st Dan and had to learn up to Shipjin, that in itself took a couple of weeks of work. I am learning Hansoo and Ilyo now; my teacher will give me the final word on that in a couple of weeks.

Train hard!

ron

 

[IcemanSK]

Master Southwick:

I'm really glad you're so passionate about Poomsae...& even more glad that you share your passion w/ us. There's so much of Taekwondo that gets ignored when the hogu goes on. I always get excited about the state of Taekwondo & my own training when I hear you talk about these competitions.

Thank you, sir.:asian:

ps. I've only seen Illyo on tape. I'm sure you do it well. Its definately a young man's poomsae. I don't know how some of the older GM's do it.

 

[TX_BB]

Master Southwick:

Would you elaborate on the changes to the forms from what is on the KKW site or Dartfish?

Thank You,

Joe

 

[matt.m]

My favorite aspect of tae kwon do is poomse. I like to hear of competitions and enthusiasm such as this.

 

[IcemanSK]

Master Southwick:

I read somewhere recently that Dartfish is NOT the standard now. (I think it was someone who went to the trials & went to a "clinic" there. They said the changes taught were contrary to Dartfish.) I'm guessing this person was mistaken. Dartfish is the standard, correct?

 

[Miles]

Master Southwick:

I read somewhere recently that Dartfish is NOT the standard now. (I think it was someone who went to the trials & went to a "clinic" there. They said the changes taught were contrary to Dartfish.) I'm guessing this person was mistaken. Dartfish is the standard, correct?

My group at the Kukkiwon Instructor Course in 2004 was told that the Kukkiwon would be working out the poomsae differences with the WTF.

I think earlier this Spring, GM Lee, Chong Kwan (who taught the physical portion of the Instructor Course) and GM Lee, Kyu Hyon (who is featured in the Dartfish DVDs) co-taught a poomsae referee seminar in Germany. This is an indication that the two organizations have worked together and standardized the poomsae.

Miles

BTW, Ron, I noticed you are using the newer spelling-poomsae. We've discussed this in the past.

 

[MSUTKD]

Miles,

Yes, I have changed. My teacher, the great man he is, said, "who cares how they want to spell it now, means same thing." Hey I need to talk to you in person (Phone).

ron

 

[terryl965]

Master Southwick and Miles here is a question to both of you since you two seem to know, if they got together to work out the differences and they are on dartfish dvd, then why is the dartfish dvd outdated and what standards are going to be used at the us open and such next year?

Thank for the replys
Master Stoker

 

[andyjeffries]

Here is the best, I believe, poomsae practitioner in the world, Ky-Tu Dang.

Hi Ron, this is going to sound offensive, but hear me out...

If he's the best poomsae practitioner in the world, how comes he didn't win gold at the World Poomsae Championships this year, "only" coming second?

What I mean by that (hopefully if you haven't taken offense by this point and you're still reading) is that - I agree with you, he's absolutely fantastic and have local copies of the youtube videos I could find of him, but what caused the Korean that won in his category to beat him?

The only think I can think of is that his kicks are technically off-target (stunning though they are, he does kick far too high for the poomsae)?

Thoughts?

Do they ever make public why you didn't get a perfect 100% score and therefore win the category?


Anyway, he's brilliant, no denying but how did he lose...

 

[MSUTKD]

Andy,

No offense taken at all. Why did Ky Tu-Dang get second? I did not make team this year and was not there to see the other competitors so I cannot say. Korea did win every division and with the last minute changes they sprung on us, were the only ones who knew the rules. Is this unfair? No, it is competition, adapt and overcome. Ky Tu Dang did a good job for what I can see from this video from the Worlds.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gDQlC_kQwdA

I love to compete because any one can win on any day. I am sure that all the competitors did their best and I look forward to the next World Championships.


ron

 

[zDom]

Last weekend I had the opportunity to participate in the first US National Poomsae Team Trials in San Diego. This event was to select the first US Poomsae Team for the World Championships in Seoul in Sept.
The WTF and Kukkiwon have standardized the poomsae and we were required to know the new way. Most of us trained for about three months to incorporate the changes into our practice, plus learn any new forms. The format was very tough and was divided by age; 14-17, 18-30, 31-40, 41-50 and 50 and up. What made this fun was the fact that you had to know 8 poomsae for each division; this will be the new standard at competitions in the next few years. The 14-17, 18-30 and 31-40 had to ready to perform Taeguek 6, 7, 8 and Koryo, Kuemgang, Taebaek, Pyongwon and Shipjin, no matter what your rank. The 41-50 division had to do Taeguek 8, Koryo, Kuemgang, Taebaek, Pyongwon and Shipjin, Jitae and Chungkwan. The 51 and up, Kuemgang all the way up to Ilyo. The competition was divided into three rounds, with the lower 50% being eliminated each round. We were prepared to have the poomsae randomly called and perform them but they told us about 30 mins before which one we would do. There were 7 judges who scored us in two categories, technical and performance, with 5 being the highest score per category. Points were taken for a variety of reasons, in technical for doing an incorrect motion and in performance for wrong timing, bad eye motion, etc. These scores were then summed and given.
It was a very hard competition and some of the divisions were so close that it came down to tenth’s of a point. All in all it is an exciting change and I am looking forward to more of the same.

ron

Not prepared, eh?

I have yet to hear confirmation that these changes were approved by the Kukkiwon.

I was not there, but I hear from someone who was that the "standardization" included eliminating all long stances.

To me, this is a MAJOR change in the art. Minor adjustments are one thing, but they really expect form competitors to change 15-20 years of training stances in three months?

Furthermore, if this IS a Kukkiwon-sanctioned change in the art of Taekwondo, then I guess this is where me and "official" taekwondo part ways forever.

Combining the stability of low stances with the mobility of high stances, to me, is one of the defining hallmarks of taekwondo as practiced in the Taeguek forms.

Additionally, requiring forms competitors to do poomsea that is above their rank requirements simply based on AGE divisions is a BAD decision, completely unfair to those organizations that compel their students to stick to their rank requirements.

Exciting change? Hardly. This is bad for taekwondo. It makes my decision to retire from taekwondo so I can concentrate on training hapkido all that much easier.

I guess it makes it easier for the WTF stylists who neglect to spend any significant time training poomsea to have yet another sport to compete in while marginalizing those who HAVE put the hard time in mastering poomsea as they SHOULD be done: with a mix of low and high stances.

What a sad day for taekwondo.

 

[MSUTKD]

Scott,

I am sorry that you feel negatively about the “new” style of Poomsae competition. The first thing is that it is not really new. The European Taekwondo Union has been using this idea for about 7 years. One year before the Worlds the WTF had a test competition, using this format, at the Korean Open. The rules for the US Team Trials were posted 3.5 months before the competition and the organizing committee answered any questions about the format. (I know because I asked them a lot of questions) The release of the Dartfish DVDs came even earlier and with that official WTF stamp on them most of us began to study what they had shown.

In the 70’s and early 80’s US National Taekwondo Championships we did not have divisions for forms, only male and female. All “black belts” were in the same division. As you can imagine this took a great deal of time. Rank had nothing to do with it. Later it was by weight and then by rank and weight. I have stopped competing in this format because when you do that you have 2 people in your division. I do not want to be given a medal for showing up. I think that dividing competitors by age is much better than by weight. Now, I understand your thoughts about rank and number of poomsae to be performed but that is what the competition is really about.

The Yudanja, black belt holder, poomsae are a very amazing collection of forms. We see Koryo, Kuemgang, Taebaek and Pyongwon all of the time now, rarely do we see Shipjin and Jitae. We never see anyone perform Chungkwan, Hansoo and Illyo. This competition format allows these forms to be seen and appreciated. Plus, to be ready to perform all of these demonstrates a dedication and understanding of poomsae beyond the norm. Just getting good at one form IS a very important thing, especially for rank consideration but we should look at the whole. Grandmaster Chong Hwa, former USTU President, used to teach Koryo to his white belts. One day I asked him why he did that and he said, “Because it takes them that long to be good at it”.

The changes in the stances bother me as well. To be honest with you, I did not try to alter my stances from what I was taught; I just did what I knew. I do not think this is a major issue……..yet. If you have been around Taekwondo long enough you see this all the time, change. But, I am comforted by the cliché “The more it changes the more it stays the same”. Let’s see how this unfolds. How we teach our students is entirely different, or can be. I would never go so far as to say that my way was the RIGHT way though. Who can say this?

I was most surprised by the skills of the people that I saw at that tournament. I always considered myself good at poomsae. I have won 50 or so medals in forms and train very hard everyday. The others in my division were the same. They were not ego driven but had a real appreciation, understanding and passion for Taekwondo. Most of us in that division have been practicing for 30 years and it showed. We all had many debates while we were there. We all thought we were doing it right. In the end we did our best and learned that “standardization” is not the end but a new beginning.
Already I have been teaching ALL of the Yudanja forms to my black belts. It has rekindled there interest in Taekwondo poomsae. I have been working more with my own teacher as he helps me with the higher forms. He is a 71 year old Korean retired professor. He has told me that he did not think that he would ever get to teach these forms to me, now he has and I will remember it forever.

Arts do not change, they evolve.

ron

 

[Miles]

Arts do not change, they evolve.

As does our understanding and appreciation of same.

Miles