What breaks do you do for tournaments?

[sifu Adams]

I just held the Ohio State martial arts Championship last weekend and we had a great time. we even had 5 Masters compeat in everything incuding sparring. For the first time I held a breaking event. Thanks to Jose Torres (NAFMA.com) from NJ the breaking rings went over great. We had students and instructors from OH, KY, TN, NJ, IL, and IND and I learnd that everyone expects differnt break. ex. In NJ they don't do a stomp kick they say that unheard of however in Ohio that was a common break. My question is what is expected and what is not expected at your tournaments and why?

 

[TigerWoman]

Our tournaments are open and pretty much anything anyone wants to do.
Examples of different breaks: (no, I do not do all these)

Colored belts-- Kicks--front, round, axe, side, spin side, spin heel, all these as jumping kicks, hand--punch, knife, ridge, palm, elbow, head butt. Also alot of flying side kicks, some double targets. Some boards lit on fire, knife or palm. Kids have to have permission from parents to head butt. I saw one eight year old though do three kids boards head butt.

For black belt--palm strike 8-10 concrete patio bricks, speed break palm (finger touch then down) 8 patio bricks, Knife 3 patio bricks, double spin heel to two apples tossed, thumb break to one patio block, spear hand break-3 bds., round kick to 4 boards or one patio block, headbutt to patio block, 360 jumpback kick blindfolded, triple front kick to three individually held boards, multiple quick breaks ending with a chin break, flying sidekick through hoop on fire to a patio block (done by a 10 yr. old) flying sidekick through two than jump and kick off a wall to break two bds. round kick. Flying side kick through three boards over three chairs. Toss up 3 bds same time and break them all doing spin heel. Double front kick-jump same time and break 2 bds in ea. hand. Alot of these, I witnessed at the last two tournaments and all from our school. TW

PS. one lady bb used to do stomp on two patio bricks but haven't seen any others but some of the kids do it. (not hard)

 

[bignick]

the last break i did...not in a tournament...was 3 cement patio blocks, palm smash, no spacers...


in our tournaments blue belts and above get 8 boards to do whatever they want with...black belts and above get 10

my last tournament i went for a double knifehand(2 finger hold each) followed by a single board head butt...then a four board side kick and single board left skip axe kick

colored belts below blue usually get an assigned break, like step turning sidekick...and the person that breaks the most wins

 

[sifu Adams]

that is interesting I would like to seen some of them. As i said before we don't do many breaks. Dose anyone do breaks from there forms? I hand one of mine do a break out of the drunken forms. I even started having my students do a board break mid form just to show them where the strike would be at.

 

[bignick]

some people will do this...

not usually for tournaments...but for demonstrations people have done breaking within their form

 

[TigerWoman]

Our Taeguek forms are really for show. Not a fighting form at all. But yes they should be kicked fast so could break a board. Our strikes: White belts just punch. Yellow-punch and front kick low. Orange-same, Green-same, add knife-neck level. High Green-add spear, Blue-add hammer fist, back fist, elbow, sidekick, High Blue-Round kick, Red-add knee strike, uppercut, crescent kicks, High Red - add jump front.

Punch is too hard for white belt. Same for knife usually at green, backfist painful on board, knee strike on board not done, crescent using the knife edge of the foot-difficult. So, basically I would say these for colored belts except for the elbow, front, round and sidekicks, are not up to their level to break. Men punch through two boards at recommended black belt test. Women don't punch. TW

 

[Mark L]

I saw one eight year old though do three kids boards head butt.

Is anyone else disturbed by this? Letting an eight year old intentionally use his head as an instrument for breaking is, IMHO, irresponsible. What could the parents and the instructor of this child have been thinking?

 

[bignick]

Is anyone else disturbed by this? Letting an eight year old intentionally use his head as an instrument for breaking is, IMHO, irresponsible. What could the parents and the instructor of this child have been thinking?

a bit...but the qualifier for me was the "kid board" which if there anything like what i'm think off...is not that big of a deal...

TW...what are the kid's board in your program...youth in ours use the regular 8 x 12, #2 pine...the "little ninja" (4-5) program uses the same board just cut in half so it's a 4'' x 12''...

 

[The Kai]

Is anyone else disturbed by this? Letting an eight year old intentionally use his head as an instrument for breaking is, IMHO, irresponsible. What could the parents and the instructor of this child have been thinking?

Actually IMHO I think any breaking for a kid is bad. The growing bones and tendons do not need any more intentional trama.

Breaking a "kids" board kind of defeats the purpose don't ya think? Besides massaging the ego
Todd

 

[TigerWoman]

Is anyone else disturbed by this? Letting an eight year old intentionally use his head as an instrument for breaking is, IMHO, irresponsible. What could the parents and the instructor of this child have been thinking?

Well, if those boards were hard, I would have objected. The parents and instructor (mine) were there and okayed it when I questioned them. That kid was big, not overweight just big boned. The boards for the kids were breaking extremely easy. I saw a palm strike with just fingers break a board when the kid didn't hit it right, it was on blocks. Alot of kids do head butt. But I never encouraged mine to do anymore than one.

Breaking boards is all about technique. Most of the kids break their boards and I don't think for the most part are injured by it because they usually break the amount of boards they are capable of breaking, considering weight, age and belt.

The kids board is half size 5 x 12. These are for 12 and under. We have a junior size 8 x 12 that is in between the 10 x12 board but we don't always use them as most of our teens can break adult boards and want them. TW

 

[MichiganTKD]

In our organization, and this is WTF rules, Masters do not compete. They officiate only. We do not have a breaking division in our tournament, only forms and sparring. For demos and testings, only black belts break. However, individual Instructors may allow color belts to break at a demo or in class to build confidence and show the power of a technique.
As far as black belts breaking for testing and demos, they pretty much do any technique they want, as long as they can do it.