How to Assume a Fighting Stance in Taekwondo

Video Transcript

"Hi everybody, I'm John Graden from The Martial Arts Teachers Association and johngraden.com. How do you assume a fighting stance in Tae Kwon Do? This is an interesting question. Why Tae Kwon Do because Tae Kwon Do is a kicking system, primarily kicking system. The hand techniques for Tae Kwon Do, and I came up in Tae Kwon Do, are not that strong. The kicks however are amazing. So what I'll typically do if I'm going to be doing a lot of kicking, is I'm going to shorten my stance up a little bit. For instance, a horse stance, a traditional karate horse stance makes it very hard to kick. In order to kick, you gotta get your legs together so you can balance. So the closer my legs are together the easier it is for me to fire the kick. So I like to bring my feet one natural step forward. So when I say natural step, just like I'm walking my natural step. I like to make my walking step my fighting stance step or my guarding stance step. Then I'm going to take this front foot, turn it in just a little bit, turn the back foot on forty five, and let's just sit down right in the middle, fifty fifty. See my legs are under me, that's really important. Typically you see beginners they'll start spreading their legs apart. In order to kick now I have to adjust to kick. That adjustment is a telegraph. That adjustment tell me as your opponent you're getting ready to kick me. I don't want to give you that advantage. So I'm going to keep my legs underneath me so that I can fire my kicks without having to take an adjustment step. So for Tae Kwon Do stylists who are doing a lot of kicks, we typically like to see the legs underneath, they're going to be moving, moving, passing, using the movement to disguise their initial motion. The initial motion is the first move of any technique. So the movement helps to disguise that initial motion. Hands for most Tae Kwon Do stylists, they just leave them down here. Because defending against kicks, in most Tae Kwon Do matches, the head cannot be punched. So you don't see most Tae Kwon Do fighters with hands up high. I think it would be a good idea. But the sport of Tae Kwon Do does not require, there's not a lot of punches to the head so they're not as concerned about protecting your head as much as they are protecting your body and firing those kicks. I'm John Graden. That's Tae Kwon Do fighting stance. Hope that helps. Thanks."