FOOT FENCING - Banned Taekwondo Technique

Taekwondo’s world governing body “World Taekwondo (WT)” made some significant rule changes over the years.

More recently, they have again revised the rules to make it more interesting after receiving criticism during the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games for “foot fencing”.

Foot fencing is where athletes keep one leg in the air and hop on the other foot in an attempt to score a kick with the elevated leg. The technique became common after the introduction of electronic hogus because the sensors could detect a slight strike of the leg and register it as a hit, where a human judge might not due to the lack of power.

The new revisions in Olympic taekwondo rules attempt to address the criticisms by penalizing non-fighting actions, “phantom strikes”, and unnecessary leg elevations.

EPISODE 22:
This is the 22nd addition to the BANNED TECHNIQUE series where we look at unorthodox or banned techniques used in sports. Be sure to check out my other videos in the Banned Techniques Series about the Long Jump Somersault, Backflip High Jump, Steadying the Bar in Pole Vault, the Spinning Technique in Javelin, the cartwheeling shotput and more.

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[BrotherCheng]

I did Taekwondo in the 90's and a bit in the early 2000's, and I have to admit the modern TKD in Olympics feels unrecognizable to me. I totally understand where the foot fencing criticism comes from. I think this is where sometimes being an Olympic sport can really be a double-edged sword because having a clear unbiased objective point based system in a combat sport is not always conductive to exciting sport.

[XrabbitGaming]

Power Era = Hwoarang vs. Kim Kaphwan.
Cut-Kick Era = Dipsy vs. Tinky Winky.

[battousaipy]

Taekwondo fan and practitioner here. The matches at the olympics were hard to watch.

[Jaedeok]

I'm a 4th Dan ITF and 3rd Dan Kukkiwon, so I have done and continue to do both. I have trained for 20 years now and operate a school. If it isn't suitable for the Olympics then take it out. I'd rather not watch it get diluted like this. My students watch the olympics and remark how its everything I taught them NOT to do. Other masters and Grandmasters are embaressed about it, and nobody really wants to promote it. There's your sign. If they dont bring back the hard contact there's no point.

[dtester]

Maybe they should make categories, Power, Technique, and Points. Each round you earn a point for each category you win. This basically combines the three eras to hopefully improve the "meta"

[samsignorelli]

3:40....fencing has been scored electronically for decades...epee starting in 1936, foil in 1956, and sabre in 1988. What the IOC pushed in the last 20 years or so was a wireless scoring system because sound engineers didn't like the slapping on the ground of the cables connecting the fencer to the scoring system.

[magnum]

I used to compete in TKD but had to stop to go to college. Around the time I stopped, was when the cut foot started popping up, but it wasn't dominating everything yet. I remember first seeing the matches where it was really prominent and just being like, "Wtf are they doing?"🤦🏼‍♂️

[guppy]

the problem is that with a fighting sport you are't going to have objectivity. 1 real punch or kick can end a fight while a 100 weak ones might not. But un-objective judging invites problems and corruption if there aren't knock outs ala boxing.

[l.a.wright]

This sounds like an easy fix.

Replace the bianary sensor with a variable sensor. Then score based on force applied multiplied by the value of the area. Winner is whoever gets the largest value with scoring double your opponent counting as 2 wins.

This insentivises power play like before but retains objectivity.

This is kinda like how hema does scoring where scores per strike are variable on the conditions of the strike.

[vicbasces]

Not only is modern TKD boring but also ugly. Has to be the silliest looking martial art. Definitely they need to change something.

[queenlip]

Boxing doesn't need electronic scoring and is doing just fine!

[ericdavis]

1-I would decrease the sensitivity of the sensors and make a focus on landing clean, more powerful strikes.
2- I would directly state what a successful combo is, and give a bonus point landing them.
3- Give bonus point for "defensive feats" like counters, consecutive dodges or blocks.
This should make the meta more about winning the individual exchanges by successfully landing clean strikes, successful combos, or successfully blocking or dodging, then countering. Think more PKA karate era kickboxing.

[MaharlikaAWA]

The original rules worked fine. They changed the rules because of politics and corruption. Selling electronic hogus is big money. Once the non-martial artist mindset where they view Taskwondo as a "fun activity" and a sport as well as performance art like dancing got popular and took over Taekwondo that was the end.

The original rules were similar to boxing scoring except usually matches didn't often go over 3 to 4 points.

[coha]

I learned tkd in the 90s from a hard family of korean brothers. I used to feel proud to say I fought TKD. During sparring points didnt count unless it inflicted damage or pain on the opponent. What counts as a point these days is insane. Now I just tell people I kickbox because I dont want them to associate me with modern tkd.

[obiwanquixote]

Full contact, no body shields or head gear, boxing scoring. It ends up being closer to power era and Kyokushin rules but with boxing scoring and no leg kicks. This encourages more displays of dominance and head kicking to find the knockout.

Karate would benefit from this as well. 30 years ago watched something that I think was called "Combat Challenge" that was full contact, no pads, open hand strikes to the head. Throws with a single strike as follow up. Great rule set that allowed for some amazing head kick and knife hand knockouts. Spinning back kicks that would just crumple people. I don't think it allowed leg kicks but did allow sweeps.

Combat sports need to be full contact and the goal has to be physical dominance. Wrestling, boxing, judo, bjj, muay thai, all have this. The more complicated the rules, the more esoteric the scoring the further away it gets from anything resembling a fight. And even uninformed audiences can see the problems.

[KenNakajima]

WTF Style TKD is a zombie... put it to rest.
That last footage of military style TKD made my heart beat again!!! power era scoring with judges and paper please!!!

[pkz]

Unless power becomes a factor again, it's just dancing.
Modern competitive Taekwondo is not a form of combat anymore. It's closer to Tai-Chi. Some way to measure effectiveness of the kicks is needed. There's a huge gap between a quick toe-touch and a hard kick. Also, KO's should be an automatic win, to encourage hard effective kicking attempts.

[Skelemonyo]

I generally think that putting more restrictions on how a competitor is allowed to fight will make it get further from a more realistic fight, and ultimately allow fighters to adapt and take advantage of the ruleset. The reason we see people hopping on 1 foot kicking in taekwondo but we don't see the same in UFC, is because its not a realistic way to fight. It works because of the current ruleset.

[laz]

A number of observations from 2024.

- Headkicks seem to require no power at all to score. A toe brushing the head gets rewarded.
- Punches to the torso - even ones that are audibly hard, get no score
- Athletes prioritise triggering the sensors rather than throwing a 'good' attractive technique.
- Clinches look like two kids in those inflatable sumo-suits bouncing off eachother - it's really ugly.

Power-era is good an all - but i think WT needs re-evaluate what WT is, and take a good long look at it's Olympic potential competitors and other exciting combat sports. Muay Thai being the big one, but also exiting sports like K1/Glory kickboxing - and in the taekwondo world, ITF or Pro-TKD.

- Eliminate clinches being 'dead' areas by allowing close range scoring knees, sweeps with single ground strikes
- Score punches consistently - potentially allow head-punches
- Add a 'g-force' sense to the helmet, to ensure that head-strikes are correctly scored
- Potentially add a techniques 'whitelist' - like Judo has - that penalises 'poor' techniques. Use a stupid kick that's not on the list, don't get the score.

[maxkim]

as someone who learned tkd "the martial art" and not tkd "let's go to the olympics, " i am constantly reminded that tkd might not be for the olympics. too many things either adds or removes too much to what makes tkd a functioning martial art. i'd say make them want to use their hands just as much as kicks by making the scoring more well rounded. there is a reason why people call tkd a "kicking karate." we need to show that tkd has hands too. the "k" in tkd is hands... this also means the ability to grapple. we need to treat tkd as a martial art that is well rounded but more light on the feet when compared to karate. the power era was great so why not place them in a ring like boxing and have them duke it out? they can't possibly say that it wasn't as fun to watch anymore since we have a bunch of combat sports that are more popular now. combination era was also a good idea. poorly executed but it was a good attempt. the judges should be hired based on their level of experience with tkd both as a practitioner and as a spectator. the rules should encourage them to ko each other for the win. it should also encourage them to use combinations just in case neither side gets a ko. for a split second decision, they should use a highspeed camera to make the final call on better technique or better combinations or better close calls that could have ended it if there was contact. and mose importantly, no protection that will prolong the match. just enough to protect the hands, feet, ribs and head. enough to protect from deadly attacks but not too much to "rather play for points"