Breaking materials

[SahBumNimRush]

For those of you who practice kyuk pa (breaking techniques) what materials do you use?

Wood? if so how thick are the individual boards? Do you plane them? 1 inch? 2x12's? or less than 1 inch thick?

Concrete or Cinder blocks? Do you use spacers? Are the use of spacers considered cheating?

Ice? how thick? how long do you freeze it? or do you buy it from an ice company?

anything else exotic?

What is the hardest thing you ever broke?

and lastly.. . what's your favorite technique to use when breaking?

 

[SahBumNimRush]

To offer answers to my own questions:

We use 1x10x12" pine boards as well as 2x10x12" pine boards for breaking

We use 2 inch cap blocks, both cinder and concrete, and we DO NOT use spacers, as we consider it cheating.. .

I break ice for demonstration purposes, but it gets messy. But it looks awesome for the crowd and sounds like a bomb going on when you break it. I have both froze my own and bought the large blocks from ice companies, and I have found the 12 inch thick blocks to be the hardest of any material I have ever broken.

We use breaking for every rank testing starting at white belt in our schools. At black belt, testing requires 3 kicks and one hand break. Standards have changed over the years, we used to require speed breaks and concrete at all black belt rank tests. Now it's optional

I think that breaking has many benefits, including being able to demonstrate technique and power. You obviously cannot hit an opponent as hard as you can, due to risk of serious injury, and breaking offers a way to demonstrate power and proper technique in a safer medium.

It is also a great mental exercise to push students to use penetrating force through the breaking material, instead of striking on the surface. Not to mention at the lower gup ranks, it's a great confidence booster.

I see those ISKA breaking competitions on the "ocho" from time to time.. . I just laugh, everything is cheap material and parlor tricks.. . spacers galore, extremely wide breaking materials (which make it easier to break). I have also seen the Korean Tigers demo team, and they use planed boards! What exactly are you "demonstrating" when you could break these things by blowing on them???

 

[Dirty Dog]

Our school (Moo Duk Kwan Tae Kwan Do) requires breaking at every level.

We use 1x10x12" pine. Other than being run across a table saw to cut it to length, it's untouched. For practice/playing, there are quite a few rebreakable boards available at our school. Anything from "Watch me break this with one finger", which is popular with the littlest, up to the equivalent of 7-8" of pine.

I've never seen anybody use spacers. Personally, I don't know if using spacers ought to be considered cheating or not. The physics involved (as I understand them) don't realy support the commonly held belief that spacers make breaks easier. I do think that the confidence that people gain from this belief helps them commit, which certainly makes breaks easier.

Some of us have broken pavers and bricks, but it's not (as far as I know...) required at our school. Similarly, some of us do speed breaks (knife hand speeds breaks are one of my favorites) but, again, I do not think they are required.

 

[granfire]

Standard 1x12 shelving boards, cut to various sized, depending on age and gender.

kids get from 4 inches on, men break 2 12 pieces - I think to recall.

However, for rank advance we use rebreakables, color according to age, personally I break blue