July 2007
The music plays. Two opponents, dressed in traditional Korean robes dance about in a circle. Their movements are fluid and graceful. At the signal they attack. With phenomenal grace and fluidity red throws a long, high kick, just missing yellow’s face. Yellow moves in and throws a low push kick, which lands just above the knee. Red stumbles as he backs away. Yellow brings his knees straight up in an aggressive offensive maneuver. Just as he closes in for the kill, red catches him behind the head with an open palm. Simultaneously, he hook sweeps yellow’s legs, and front trips him. Yellow falls flat on his face.

The referee, wearing an impressive costume, steps between them.  He waves a collapsible fan, declaring red the winner.

The next match is much more athletic.  Red leaps into the air, throwing a flying kick.  Blue throw does a jump, catch and throw, driving red to the mat.  Blue wins. 

The art is Taekkyon, an ancient Korean martial art which combines dance with kicks and throws.  The purpose of the match is not to injure your opponent, but instead, to throw him off balance. 

During the Japanese occupation, 1910 – 1945, the art was banned and nearly died out.  Fortunately one very old master, named Song Duk-Ki, survived.  He is personally credited with having saved the art, continuing to teach students, until his death, at age 96, in 1987. 

In recent years, Taekkyon has enjoyed a resurgence, with national competitions and Taekkyon demonstrations at national festivals.  The university students I interviewed said that they enjoyed practicing Taekkyon because they could enjoy all of the physical and health benefits of martial arts, without getting injured.  One friend said, “Taekkyon is part of our cultural heritage.  By practicing, I am helping to keep our history alive.” 

For several years, since coming to Asia, I had seen Taekkyon matches on cable.  As much as I was fascinated by the unusual art and its fluid movements, I didn’t think it would be a serious martial. After my first session of Taekkyon I found I had tremendous respect for the practitioners.  They were incredibly skilled athletes and martial artists.  And, although their outfits were somewhat girly, consisting of a robe which flairs like a skirt, and their feet bound in tiny booties, not nearly as macho as my Muay Thai uniform, I found that they possessed nearly perfect fundamentals, a step that many martial artists skip.  The art is not actually designed for combat, but any of the Taekkyon team members was poised to become a great fighter if they should chose to make some slight changes to their techniques.

The work out routine concentrated on jumps, breathing, flexibility, and above all grace and balance.  Two of the team members weighed over 90kgs but had the dexterity and flexibility one would expect from a much leaner athlete.  Many of the movements were familiar stretching techniques which I had experienced in Hop Kido and Kuk Sul Won schools I had trained in.  But when the tempo increased, and the Taekkyon players began doing their knee thrusts, I was lost.  This wasn’t Muay Thai.  We weren’t throwing knee kicks.  The routine was straight out of a Broadway review.  I kept expecting a flaming choreographer to come out, clapping his hands, reciting, “Step, step, cross, step knee and kick, step, cross, step, cross, knee and kick.”  I wondered if we were supposed to do jazz hands. The Taekkyon guys, however, were all business.  They alternated right and left, and with each step, their hips shifted in the most unusual way.  I would learn later that, although their upper body was rocking back and forth, the center of gravity remained constant, and the players were almost impossible to knock down. 

When we lined up to kick, I thought I was back in familiar territory.  Taekkyon uses a round house and a push kick, just like my familiar Muay Thai. But the kick in Taekkyon has to be slow.  The kick comes off of the hip.  The knee is not chambered, and the kick does not explode at the last possible second, just before striking the target.  Instead, in one fluid, continuous movement, the kick comes up, moving constantly and steadily to the target.  The foot makes contact softly, not striking.  As the goal is to knock the opponent off balance, all of the kicks, even the round house were designed to push, not strike.

As a fighter, I found it impossible to throw a slow kick to the head.  The target was lowered, and even at waist height, it was all I could do to maintain my balance while throwing a slow kick.  And of course, when it landed, my kick had no force at all.  The amazing thing about proper Taekkyon kicks is that they are incredibly powerful.

When I was training in Kung Fu in Taiwan, my Sifu told me “As high as you can kick slowly is as high as you can kick.”  He believed that westerners, particularly Americans, put all of our energy into throwing our leg up in the air anyway we could, and calling it a high kick.  He said that this is why we all have knee injuries by age thirty.  We are using our power to oppose our bodies natural limitations, which of course tears muscles and tendons.  His idea was that you should first learn to kick slowly.  When you can kick slowly, perfectly, and at a great height, putting power and speed into the kick makes it deadly. 

Once again, at the Taekkyon school, my new teacher had me standing by the ballet bar, throwing painfully slow round house kicks, which I could barely get up to my waist. 

My teacher back in Taiwan once told me a true master only throws one kick a day, but that kick takes eight hours to complete.  Glancing at my watch, I was hoping my Taekkyon teacher didn’t have a similar philosophy. 

When we switched to the front push kick, I realized that Muay Thai has mislabeled this kick.  In Muay Thai the push kick is more of a stab or a strike.  But in Taekkyon, it is a true push, which knocks your opponent back. 

Taekkyon contained elements that reminded me of so many other martial arts, and yet, like everything else in Korea, it was uniquely its own.  The kicks were similar to Tae Kwan Do, as there were also leaps and flying kicks.  But in Tae Kwan Do, kicks are fast, and there should be an audible POP when they hit the target just right.  Taekkyon kicks are soft, and they push the target.  There were elements of Chinese Twe So (pushing hands), as the players were constantly looking for the opponent’s balance points.  They knew exactly when a head kick would throw a man off balance.  They weren’t knocking him out.  They were knocking him down because at that exact minute they calculated that a certain amount of force to the head would take the man off balance.

There were elements of Muay Boran (ancient Muay Thai).  Unlike modern, sport Muay Thai, ancient Muay Thai utilizes a wide variety of kicks, even striking with the bottom of the foot, rather than the shin.  In Ancient Muay Thai, as in Taekkyon, push kick to the thigh is a common technique used to knock a man off balance.  Taekkyon also contained elements of Hop Kido/Kuk Sool Won, when they would catch a kick and throw.  But the signature Hop Kido/Kuk Sool Won technique was that they would catch an arm and use a joint lock as a throw.  They had techniques of trapping the hand, and applying pressure to the elbow, driving the opponent into the ground. 

Taekkyon impressed me.  It is a beautiful art, but more than that, the practitioners had phenomenal control over their bodies, placing slow, perfect kicks anywhere they wanted on their opponent’s body.  I still think I will stick with my combat sports, but you will see me sitting in the front row next to Frank Sinatra, at the next Taekkyon competition!

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