22.2.2010 / Course "Hands techniques a little bit different"

Hand techniques in a slightly different way

Next seminar with Martin Svitek took place at Černý most on Saturday (20/2/10), this time focused especially on hand techniques and also on cardio, what probably was not main goal, but we – lazy boys – had hard time :-D Less than expected came, but at the other hand Martin had enough time to put individual advices to everyone (of 4).

We started with warm-up and stretching, then with few rounds of light
sparring to
show Svíťa what to focus on. Main problem was probably our static stance so we did few stepping exercises (dodging, side steps, head movements...etc.). Basic techniques – direct punches, hooks and uppercuts (ap jirugi, dolyo jirugi, ollyo jirugi – translator ;o) were next part of training. We have started with the easiest one – directs, I thought that there is nothing to correct on it, but unfortunately I found out that I am nearly completely wrong. I was not balanced and with not enough power. I hope I corrected most of mistakes. Hooks were harder, because we do not use it often in taekwondo and naturally it is not taught often. Same applies for uppercuts, I have to say that this was the first time I trained this technique. All tree techniques were practices punching opponent’s gloves focusing on one of taekwondo’s theory of power principles – hip movement. We did some pad work at the end of training combining all we did practice before. The hardest was round with Svíťa (Martin Svitek) who motivated us to do everything correct. Lot of time passed so we had not time for other part of plan – hosinsool and because we were tired we decided to stop training (after nearly 2 hours) and go for lunch ;o)

To summarize, I may say that training was worthwhile, I remember many details to correct and now only thing to do is to practice again and again... I think that this kind of training is good way to improve, because we have chance to learn techniques we normally do not practice – these are techniques of taekwondo but not used normally in sport sparring so we don’t focus on them. Taekwondo is art of self-defense and in real conflict this knowledge may be useful.

Pavel Šnábl