Poomsae or sparring?

[NPTKD]

I was wondering how often some of you spar? And what type of sparring( olympic or self defense) Does your school have certain days or weeks? Or do you put more into Poomsae and self defense? I try to balance it out with one week of Olympic sparring, self defense & one steps the next week poomsae. It seems to work for me. I tried a compatition sparring class for awhile with little interest. It bothers me that when my student compete they do alright in sparring but they are not at that ... you know, level like some other schools. They do really well in Poomsae. Anyone else have tis problem or maybe some answers?
Thanks

 

[terryl965]

Well for us it is mix in all week long, this is how it goes M-W-F sparring and S.D. T-T poomsae and one steps. We have a competition team that get an extra couple of hours a week working on sparring techs. for competition. Saturday is devoted for point and continous point sparring and that is a seperate class. In the meantime we always work on kick and punches and combination as well as footwork drills. This is one reason that all my classes are 1 1/2 and two hours for the competition team, the only classes we have that are 45 or an hour in the beginner classes. Hope that helps. We seem to be very competitive when we go to tournament and win our fair share or I should say we win more than alot of people, you have to make commitment if you really want to be on that level with competition, because alot od schools only do this. A traditional school needs to find that balence to make the sport and Art work together.

 

[Manny]

Well I have to admit it I don't spar too often, I only spar if I have to, this translates to examination (quarterly). I have to admit it I like point karate stile sparring the most where brains are better than just trowing most of the kicks to the empty air, some times in the dojang we do some kind of point karate we call half kyorugi. In half kyorugi we try to catch our partner with combo kicks and punches (no punches to the face/had) and this is quite relaxing and good, we wear no hogu, helmet and safety equipment altough there are sometimes we use strong kicks if the atmosphere get warm, you know.

I like self defense and poomsae the most, I'am a quiet person that does not like to fight, however if I have to I do it I do my best.

When I was yourger I did not compete in tournaments because I did not like it, yes I atended some local,regional and state tornaments but competing was not my thing, I believe that maybe if in those years there were poomsae competition I would compete in this.

Right now I am loosing weight, I hope to drop some 40+ pounds maybe this will improve my stamina and flexibility and maybe give me some speed caus right now I'm a little slow.

Manny

 

[ATC]

I think we are a balanced school. We have three Sa Dan's as head instructors at our school and each has his/her own specialties.

Master Suh is a fighter and that is what he does best, so he runs our fighting team mostly but still teaches some regular classes as well. Since he is a perfectionist his forms or poomse is really really good as well. But all his technical training is focused for making you better in the ring or any fight.

Master Lopez can fight but tend to like poomse best. He is in charge of our poomse team. Master Lopez likes to fix the small details that are needed to win at any poomse competition. Master Lopez is also a bit rogue so he does not alway teach pure TKD. Since he teaches our adult classes he uses about 50/50 hand and feet. Lots of punching techniques that you don't often get with TKD. Lots of boxing and he even brought in some sticky hands Wing Chung KungFu drills for us to do.

Master Angel Suh teaches our kids classes and has the temperament to do this. Teaching kids takes a special kind of person. She use to be a fighter but has since stopped training for that, but works really really well with the kids.

Then there is GM Mun. He owns all the schools but lives and teaches up in Oregon. He is cut from Korea and is old school. Lots of poomse to teach the basics and brutal SD and one step. Lots of philosophy as well. We only get to see him during test time and on special occasions.

So in all I think we are lucky to have three Masters that are each good at what they do and we as students can pick and choose what we want.

 

[epi-do]

For classes on Mon-Tues, we do poomse & self defense. On Wed-Thurs, we do sparring. It is primarily Olympic style, and we do have to use protective equipment. For the beginners classes, sparring nights consist mostly of one-steps, various drills, and no contact sparring. We aren't allowed to do any sort of contact sparring until you begin attending the intermediate classes.

 

[NPTKD]

For classes on Mon-Tues, we do poomse & self defense. On Wed-Thurs, we do sparring. It is primarily Olympic style, and we do have to use protective equipment. For the beginners classes, sparring nights consist mostly of one-steps, various drills, and no contact sparring. We aren't allowed to do any sort of contact sparring until you begin attending the intermediate classes.

Is that green belt level?

 

[granfire]

well, we do both.

We test on forms and sparring and from red belt on in breaking as well.

What we do in class depends largely on what part of the cycle we are on in our 8 week schedule. Right after tests we tend to do more forms, and towards the end we do more sparring. But usually we try to get in a couple of rounds (sport, medium contact,non Olympic) every class. We do have one designated sparring clinic, once a week, and we will do drills and rounds and what not for the whole class...

 

[goingd]

I don't spar as much as I used to. I've done pretty well in some smaller competitions and not so great in a couple. I love sparring but I would like to see more schools balance time for sport sparring and more realistic sparring. I prefer poomse though. I love to develop and work on all the little endless details.

 

[epi-do]

Is that green belt level?

Our intermediate belts are light blue, green and purple. Our belts go as follows:white, yellow, orange, light blue, green, purple, brown, red, dark blue, dark blue w/ stripe, black.