Sine Wave Article - thoughts comfirmed!

[terryl965]

What do the Taegeuks have to do with sine wave? Sine wave theory, for what it's worth, may be applicable to ITF forms, but I doubt it can be applied to the Kukkiwon forms. The Kukkiwon forms are a separate entity. One of the reasons, to me, why Kukkiwon and ITF should stay separate (in other words, pick one).

It was used as a comparision to the Tuls and since the TG are so simple they cannot be misunderstood. Nothing more, it never said they had the swine wave in them. Since the General was misquated alot of the time at seminar because people did not understand or refuse to understand. The TG could never have those problems.

 

[StuartA]

It's really bad Stuart, I'm not too sure who is really in charge of it anymore, too. I know that General Choi's son lives in Montreal and don't know if he is in charge or an Vietnamese fellow. I have also heard that there is a group in Austria that say they are in charge, too.

It is bad (though I was solo by the time all the 'bad' happened), but basically there are 3 groups calling themsleves ITF - all have legitimate claims to the title in one way or another. More details can be found here (if you are interested): http://www.raynerslanetkd.com/SECTION2-Latest_Developments.html

All of these other groups like TKD International, ITU, ITA, confuses me.

Me too.. I know of some, dont know the inner ideals of others and thats why i simply do martial arts and stay away from all that - I see the politics and changes as my "TKD Soap Opera" though - usually available ona weekly basis lol

Which ones want sine wave and which ones don't. Is a president of the ITF a president for life like GM Choi, I don't know.

I can answer the first one as thats all the ITFs (not sure about all the off shoots though), as they claim to be following the lastest instructions of Gen Choi - right or wrong (which is my little bug bear - as some of it was political IMO and hence wrong to follow). As for president for life - I'm nt sure, in one or two of them probibly not as they follow the '4 term elected' type thing, in the final one a man was put in place at the dying regquest of the General, so perhaps! (Though Ive heard he wants to step down anyway)

I kept the ITF forms before First Dan for many years though after opening my school. We had some affiliation with a group in New York and this was ok for a while.

Yes, many of the old ITF intructors who transfered to the WTF did the same, some still do.

They decided to get close to Taekwondo International and I met one of Gen Choi's direct students Mark Mcarthy. I am a physics research tech and some of my students are Proffs and Phd candidates.

TKD-I was formed after they lfet the ITF in the 70's, much later in fact - are we talking about the same group (TAGB)?

Can you see where this is going ?

Oh yes And it does make me wonder why no one ever questioned it all before, I guess it before because of the way the General was!

We listened to them explain the physics of the sine wave...

Been there as well.. biting my lip etc. trying to remain polite! Koolaide I think my US describe it as for some! (Not us btw)

The cost of 1500 dollars was a bit too high to be standing in one spot for long periods of time with your arm out etc. All the time hoping that they might teach us something that we didn't already know.

LOL.. been there too and thought the same

The doctors and I tried to find some advantage to using the sine wave theory but we came up empty. Reminds me of the old saying "******** baffles brains" .

LOL - sounds about right. Might have to use that quote

Stuart

 

[StuartA]

What do the Taegeuks have to do with sine wave? Sine wave theory, for what it's worth, may be applicable to ITF forms, but I doubt it can be applied to the Kukkiwon forms. The Kukkiwon forms are a separate entity. One of the reasons, to me, why Kukkiwon and ITF should stay separate (in other words, pick one).

As Exiles already put, the science is already there. Sine-wave can be performed in WTF (or any) forms, whether it enhances or benefits it is the real matter at hand and as I dont believe it enhances the ITF forms (the newer version thats it - remember there are 2 version) so its not gonna add anythiong to WTF forms IMO.

Stuart

 

[Marginal]

I'm in agreement and feel for whatever reason it certainly wasnt accidental from wearing shoes!!Funny thing is, ITF-V did some scientific research on the sine-wave a couple of years back and in their conclusion they didnt mention power at all - just (they said) it increased speed! Either way, i still wasnt convinced but there ya go!

Politics aside, the way I've been taught it, sine wave is mainly there to facilitate movement. The thought being the easier movement is supposed to lend power to the technique. Bending the knee makes it easier to move the leg forward compared to a Shotokan style stance that requires more use of the hip to get the rear leg moving in something like a walking stance.

I've noticed that it does tend to discourage leaning forward to initiate movement. So that it aids power in the sense that keeping to proper form does.

 

[tellner]

Ninjamom, that's an excellent story with a good point. There's another one that comes to mind, though, one which captures it in even sharper relief. And it has monks.

Back before printing presses scriptures were copied in the Scriptorium or its local equivalent. The monks would sit with their paper or palm leaves or papyrus and their pens or brushes. One of the monks would read the original text, and everyone would copy it as he spoke.

A young monk was working in the Scriptorium copying the Rule of the Order along with the other novices. During a break he approched the Reader's desk.

"Elder Brother, I'm troubled."

"Why is that, Brother?"

"How do we know that what we're writing is correct? Our Order has been in existence for almost a thousand years. How do we know that there aren't errors?"

The Elder Brother explained how they were working from a True Copy of the original Rule. He showed how they checked copies against one another and made sure that only the best and most experienced scribes' efforts were preserved.

"I understand, Elder Brother, but I am a little troubled.

"You have a good heart, youngster, so I will set your mind at rest."

He sent for the Abbot. The Abbot listened and thought for a while. Finally he said "You make a good point. The original Rule written in the hand of our Founder is in the crypts. It's old and fragile, but your concerns are honest. I will go and check. Handling it once in a thousand years should be alright."

The old man took a lantern and a ring of huge ancient iron keys and headed off to where the most important treasures of the Order were kept.

An few minutes passed, then an hour.

Half the afternoon passed, and the monks were getting a little worried. Finally a small party went after the Abbot. From deep in the gloom they heard wailing. As they approached they heard a rhythmic dull thumping.

Finally they came on the Abbot. His clothes were ripped. There were tears in his eyes. He had torn out most of his hair and was banging his head against the cold stone walls crying "We forgot an 'R'! We forgot an 'R'!"

"What's wrong, Abbot? What's wrong?" asked the shocked monks.

"The word was CELEBRATE!"

 

[dancingalone]

Politics aside, the way I've been taught it, sine wave is mainly there to facilitate movement. The thought being the easier movement is supposed to lend power to the technique. Bending the knee makes it easier to move the leg forward compared to a Shotokan style stance that requires more use of the hip to get the rear leg moving in something like a walking stance.

I've noticed that it does tend to discourage leaning forward to initiate movement. So that it aids power in the sense that keeping to proper form does.

A bit late but I just noticed this statement and wanted to respond to it. Correct technique actually begins with the foot initiating the kinetic chain. Shotokan teachers emphasize the hips when instructing beginners to help isolate the hip motion and make it easier to understand, but it shouldn't be left there. Eventually when you introduce the concept of building force from the ground, the foot must necessarily come to the forefront of discussion.

 

[Marginal]

A bit late but I just noticed this statement and wanted to respond to it. Correct technique actually begins with the foot initiating the kinetic chain. Shotokan teachers emphasize the hips when instructing beginners to help isolate the hip motion and make it easier to understand, but it shouldn't be left there. Eventually when you introduce the concept of building force from the ground, the foot must necessarily come to the forefront of discussion.

Yeah, I've been in Shotokan before so I know there's more to it than just stumping along. The concept's usually exaggerated in the TKD demonstrations I've seen on the subject. (You'd think Shotos all have artificial legs.) That's just how the info has been presented.

Really, the degree of how much power is influenced by either method seems fairly small to me. Seems more like an issue of when the information's presented.

 

[sooshimkwan]

I've just read through all the posts in this thread. There is so much I wanted to commented on along the way, but cannot remember it all. I wish I had taken notes. (There's no way I'm going to read from the top again . . .)

Let me start out by saying that when I started doing Taekwon-Do we did it the old style with no "new" sine wave motion. There was a "natural" wave, but power generation for us came almost exclusively from hip rotation. In the meantime I've come to accept the sine wave motion and even -- dare I admit it on this somewhat anti-sine wave movement thread? -- appreciate its contribution.

Yes it is true that Gen. Choi gave it to the North Koreans as "a gift" and that there may have been some political motive behind it, but I think it is here where I disagree with some on this thread. I don't think he suddenly made up some arbitrary motion just so he could distinguish the North Koreans from the rest. I think that even if he wasn't involved with North Korea at all, that he would still have steered Taekwon-Do in this direction.

The reason I'm saying so is because there had always been a slow evolution away from Japanese Karate towards something more unique, more Korean.

The section quoted from the book A Killing Art actually makes it clear that the sine wave motion created: "a slower, more rhythmic, bobbing-on-the-sea look that dramatically distinguished it from Karate and Kim Un-yong's Tae Kwon Do."

While this "bobbing-on-the-see look" seem to have appeared out of nowhere, I strongly believe that it did in fact have a very specific origin: Taekkyeon (also Romanized as Taekkyun). I made this point on another thread, but since nobody has touched on the Taekkyeon connection on this thread, I guess I can repeat it here.

In its original form Taekwon-Do was not much different from karate. Although Taekwon-Do has changed quite a bit since then, most people still try to understand Taekwon-Do from that old paradigm and within this "karatesque" paradigm this "bobbing" motion just doesn't make sense at all. In fact, much effort is put into karate training not to raise-or-lower your head during your motions. That paradigm is innately flawed because it negates the other chief influence into Taekwon-Do -- even if you do not consider Taekkyeon's influence a strong one, it is an influence that ought to be considered.O

Once you've practised in Taekkyeon (like I have) and you are then confronted with ITF Taekwon-Do and it's strange sine wave motion, you would not think it that peculiar at all. A type of "bobbing" motion in Taekkyeon is part of their most basic footwork, called pumbalbgi 품밟기. I believe that were you trained in Taekkyeon and took up karate you would find it excruciatingly difficult to adopt karate's bobbingless motions while the transition from Taekkyeon to ITF Taekwon-Do with its sine wave motion would be much easier. (Of course this is merely my guess, as I don't actually know anybody that has made such a conversion from Taekkyeon to ITF Taekwon-Do. I am inferring it more on a type of reversed logic based on my personal experience of having taken up Taekkyeon after having already done ITF Taekwon-Do for many years. I am quite sure that were I to have taken up Taekkyeon before I was familiar with the sine wave motion during the time my movements looked more like karate, I would have struggled much more learning to move "properly" in Taekkyeon.)

Simply put, if your martial art experience have always been karate style motions (including old style Taekwon-Do), the sine wave motion looks and feels quite foreign. However, if you had a martial art background where the motions are less linear, like in Taekkyeon or Aikido, the sine wave motion would not seem so strange to you. Furthermore, your understanding of the sine wave motion will also most likely not be so simplistic as "down-up-down". You may very well recognise it as one manifestation of other common (soft style) martial art principles like the circle principle or the yin-yang principle.

Although Gen. Choi did have the (Shotokan) karate paradigm, he also had a Taekkyeon paradigm from his youth. The "bobbing" was not an arbitrary addition to Taekwon-Do, but was actually the inclusion of a principle from Taekkyeon, which in effect changed Taekwon-Do so that it became more Korean and less Japanese, more Taekkyeon and less Karate.

Well, those are my thoughts . . .

Regards,
S

 

[Dragonboy]

Our college club brought Mr Paul O Leary (5th Dan TKD and 2nd Dan Ao Denkou Jitsu) up to do a cross club seminar last year. He's a student of Rick Clarke (that pressure point fighting and jujutsu system).
He was quite vocal on the fact he didn't care for the sine wave and that he believed it was just Gen/ Choi wanting to be different from all the other Tang Soo Do/Moo Duk Kwan teachers/organisations out there

Just my two cents, and I'm a Karate-ka, so I might be biased.

 

[Dragonboy]

Reminds me of a story....

Some of my students in sword class wanted to know about a certain seated meditation posture used in our art, and why the hands were held in a certain manner. I related the historical tale (?) of an elderly group of Buddhist monks in the Korean mountains in the time of the Hwa Rang who met together for years to meditate each morning. Shocked by the sudden death of one of their members, they realized that they had achieved much on their journey to enlightenment, but had failed to pass it on to the next generation. Therefore, they each vowed to train one disciple to continue in the practices of the monastery meditation arts before they died.

The eldest of the monks, Master Wong Sang, began first by taking a young student as an apprentice. As the most junior member of the group, this young man became the 'gofer' and general servant of the others, while not in group meditation. On the first morning of meditation with disciple and elders, a stray cat entered the monastery and began wailing by the door. Disturbed by the noise and concerned his new disciple would be easily distracted, the elderly Master Wong Sang commanded his disciple to remove the stray cat and tie it by a leash to a post on the far side of the monastery. The Master's intent was to allow the meditation to continue sans cat, but provide the animal with milk and food afterwards.

Content with the cordial monks and a warm morning meal, the stray cat adopted the monastery as its home. The generous monks were equally pleased to provide the cat with this simple service, and each morning, the young disciple removed the cat to the post at the far end of the compound prior to meditation, then provided it with breakfast afterwards.

Soon Master Wong Sang died, and the next eldest monk selected a new disciple, to maintain the number of monks in the meditation circle. As the youngest, this new disciple's first task became the care and feeding of the cat. Each morning he would tie the cat to the post at the far end of the monastery so as not to disturb the monks in meditation. Wong Sang's disciple graduated to new, more important tasks.

Eventually, all of the original, elderly monks died, each having one-by-one initiated a new disciple into the art of meditation. Finally the cat also died. Then, the eldest (most senior) of the second generation of meditating monks did the only logical thing - he immediately ordered that a new cat be procured at once. After all, every monk in the group knew that you could not meditate in the morning without having a cat tied to a post, because that is the way it had always been done.

Haha that's a nice story, I like stories with cats...

Here's mine. A fairly recent problem it was.
Our Karate club brings over and visits the chief instructor a few times a year. But we heard him say, with regards to how a back kick ("ushiro-geri" in Karate) is done pivoting on the lead foot kicking with the back, pivot again, land forward.

So he says: your "head is the last to leave and first to arrive". But we misinterpreted it and wrote it down to work on for a few month/a year. We ended up turning our body, while still keeping our eye on the guy, turning to look, then landing the kick. I know other systems do it this way, is fine! You have your eye on the target when you land that kick.

BUT, He was telling us not to turn our heads to look at our kicking target as by the second time we looked it was too late the kick should have already landed there when our back turned. Every time we looked it turned into a kind of side thrust kick with the side and flat of the foot. A back kick should be the heel and the flat. what he meant was: head is the "last to leave, then after the kick, first to arrive while retracting the kicking foot." Guess what happens when you take everything as gospel. We might have misinterpreted.

I can honestly say, I still hate the ushiro geri kick.

 

[MSUTKD]

Oh no, old sine wave thread alive again. I think it should be cosine wave but that is another story, (you will get it if you study math/science. Sine wave is bunk, period. The science is not there and any that I have read is a complete misunderstanding of biomechanics, physics and even math; peer review please before you publish. There are thousands of actual scientific papers (published in peer review journals for actual scientists) on “hitting” things and not one, that I have read (I have only actually read about 200), has any inkling of the sine wave motion some schools are teaching. Sometime we think we are doing something correct but when we see the actual results or approach it with critical thinking the truth hits us. One of my favorite science thinking phases: There is a beautiful theory slain by an ugly fact.

 

[chrispillertkd]

Our college club brought Mr Paul O Leary (5th Dan TKD and 2nd Dan Ao Denkou Jitsu) up to do a cross club seminar last year. He's a student of Rick Clarke (that pressure point fighting and jujutsu system).
He was quite vocal on the fact he didn't care for the sine wave and that he believed it was just Gen/ Choi wanting to be different from all the other Tang Soo Do/Moo Duk Kwan teachers/organisations out there

Just my two cents, and I'm a Karate-ka, so I might be biased.

I have not heard of Mr. O'Leary before so pardon my ignorance. How long was he in the ITF and how many times did he train with Gen. Choi; GM Choi, Jung Hwa GM Rhee, Ki Ha; GM Park, Jung Tae; etc.?

Pax,

Chris

 

[chrispillertkd]

Oh no, old sine wave thread alive again. I think it should be cosine wave but that is another story, (you will get it if you study math/science. Sine wave is bunk, period. The science is not there and any that I have read is a complete misunderstanding of biomechanics, physics and even math; peer review please before you publish. There are thousands of actual scientific papers (published in peer review journals for actual scientists) on “hitting” things and not one, that I have read (I have only actually read about 200), has any inkling of the sine wave motion some schools are teaching. Sometime we think we are doing something correct but when we see the actual results or approach it with critical thinking the truth hits us. One of my favorite science thinking phases: There is a beautiful theory slain by an ugly fact.

I thought similarly the first time I saw it.

Pax,

Chris

 

[Earl Weiss]

Oh no, old sine wave thread alive again. I think it should be cosine wave but that is another story, (you will get it if you study math/science. Sine wave is bunk, period. The science is not there and any that I have read is a complete misunderstanding of biomechanics, physics and even math; peer review please before you publish. There are thousands of actual scientific papers (published in peer review journals for actual scientists) on “hitting” things and not one, that I have read (I have only actually read about 200), has any inkling of the sine wave motion some schools are teaching. Sometime we think we are doing something correct but when we see the actual results or approach it with critical thinking the truth hits us. One of my favorite science thinking phases: There is a beautiful theory slain by an ugly fact.

Well, then you haven't read some of the boxing stuff that talks about flecing your knees, also stuff on closed chain theory and kinetic linking.

If you take it too literaly and feel it should be refined to co sine wave because the initial flex of the knees causes you to slightly lower initialy first, you are correct. On the other hand you are over analyzing a simple metaphor used to contrast it with jerky motion of sawtooth wave or no up and down like flat wave. (More metaphors)
ath will have you critique many of General choi's metaphorical examples including whether a walking stance realy looks like walking, or the angle of the L stance being off and there is that whole U shape block thing that looks more like a "C".
If, on the other hand you think flxing the knees is OK and having the head slightly rise and lower is good for helping generate power in hand techniques as opposed to some Karate systems where the head stays level, thenm you have accepted the basic premise of sine wave. Of course you can rejecty that as well since it is apparent some sytems firmly believe in amintaining the head at a certain level.

 

[Earl Weiss]

Skip to about the 4 minute mark.

 

[MSUTKD]

Exactly! Nothing like sine wave. I have read the boxing papers, at least most of them. If it was real, everyone would do it.

 

[Gwai Lo Dan]

Skip to about the 4 minute mark.

Ah crap - it's blocked in Canada.

 

[chrispillertkd]

Exactly! Nothing like sine wave. I have read the boxing papers, at least most of them.

If you've watched the video Master Weiss posted and read the material on boxing then the only other option left is you simply have no understanding of sine wave. Nothing wrong with that, of course. You just don't have any understanding of it on a practical level (and I would question your understanding of it on a theoretical level).

If it was real, everyone would do it.

You mean like boxers and Taekwon-Doin?

Pax,

Chris

 

[Earl Weiss]

Exactly! Nothing like sine wave. I have read the boxing papers, at least most of them. If it was real, everyone would do it.

Do you see boxers punching like Karate people without flexing their knees to generate force and keeping their heads level? That's not what the Boxer in the video described, and it's not what the video describes.

AFAIAC most everyone like Boxer's do it. Bruce lee did it in the secret of the 1 and 3 inch punch. Thye just don't use the metaphor.

 

[tkd1964]

Knee Spring has been around in ITF Taekwon-Do since the 1960's. In the first TKD Bible (1973?) it went into explaining knee spring in movement and raising and lowering the body when stationary. In the 1980's a new name was given to it, Sine Wave, to show the smooth movement of the practitioner. It wasn't until the late 1990's that the Down-Up-Down came into play. Why this came into play I don't know. You would have to ask someone who was close to Gen. Choi, but it contradics the teachings as set down by Gen. Choi. You raise the body slightly then drop to add Mass to the technique. Dropping(down) then rising(up)and dropping again is wasting energy. It is my opinion that because of constent questioning and suggestions, Gen. Choi made it LOOK like a Sine Wave(or Co-Sine) to appease the students. JMO

Taekwon!!
Mike