hey you british people....

[neryo_tkd]

reading the posts here i have noticed that there are differences in the way things are done in martials arts here in europe and the rest of the world,

so i would like to ask u who come from the UK to tell me whether or not there was a unification of WTF and ITF in ur country???

there is no such thing here and WTF is more dominant. a friend of mine who used to train ITF but teaches now WTF told me that those 2 federations became one. the equipment used in the unified federation is apparently the combination of both: the fighters wear gloves, punches to the head are allowed, fighters wear shin guards, headwear, but no body armour.

am i correctly informed??? help me out...

thanx guys :)

[Helm]

Im not the person to ask, I just came to this country for good tea and delicious crumpets. What what.

[Tosh]

Originally posted by neryo_tkd

am i correctly informed??? help me out...


You are incorrectly informed :D

The sparring you describe is ITF style sparring, although usually shin and forarm guards are optional as with headguards (depening on association).

I'm sure if you did a search in the forum you would come up with a history of the ITF and WTF. In the UK certainly UKTA/ITF TKD was introduced in 1967 by Grandmaster Rhee Ki Ha. I'm sure TKD had made it over in some form or another but Grandmaster Rhee was the first to have TKD instructor on his passport :D.

However, told you ITF/WTF merged in the UK is misinformed. Both ITF and WTF exist and certain groups train both competition styles (The TAGB I believe are grooming students in the National squad to compete in WTF events).

I'm sure other members will have additional information :D and my educated guess would say the rest of Europe are predominantly ITF affiliated.

[neryo_tkd]

thanx for the information :-)

in my country and the neighbouring countries WTF is definitely the style that is trained, here and there u can find an ITF club, but there is only a VERY small number of people training ITF, there are no competitions and u almost don't hear anything about those clubs because they are almost non-existant.
i can't speak for entire europe though.

[Tosh]

Originally posted by neryo_tkd
thanx for the information :-)

i can't speak for entire europe though.

Would help if I knew what country you are talking about neryo :D

Why not fill in the location bit in your profile??

[Holgate]

As far as I know there is no merger between ITF and WTF however Tosh is right when he says the TAGB are training some of their top students (Becky Riggs, David Honey, Joe Schembri etc) in the WTF forms, something which they put into practice at the Euro Cup a few weeks back with some success.

Gradually even us lowly students are training more in WTF sparring even if it's to make us better at our usual point stop but also to make us aware of the more 'sporting side' of Tae Kwon Do.

I'm personally not against the teaching of both forms but I do feel sometimes the tradition of TKD is often lost in the sport and entertainment side, this was shown vividly yesterday at the 20th Anniversary of the TAGB event in Birmingham, I'm not in total agreement with it because it becomes all about showmanship and not about martial arts...but then perhaps it's me being old fashioned and out of date.

There does seem to be a move in the UK towards the ITF (TAGB especially) and WTF coming together more for events and cross style practice which I think is a good thing, after all we were all spawned from the one form to start with, but wether they will actually merge is another matter although I wouldn't be suprised to see some WTF schools on an indivdual basis join with Tae Kwon Do International.

[alcapone]

The other members here are correct, there is no unification of WTF and ITF in England. The confusion comes in with certain associations like the UKTA and possibly TAGB (no offence meant by that guys!). These have been formed as a style of their own based on ITF, they are not (really) ITF, I'm not 100% sure about TAGB but I know UKTA was formed by British guys who got sick of being ripped off by Korean masters charging £1000's for a lesson!!! Because of this, it's kinda formed it's own style that is ITF based but does have elements of WTF as well (probably due to WTF stlye practioners joining these associations in the early days to get away from the hefty charges as well!)

As far as I know this is how it is in England, but I practice WTF and am not a member of either of these associations so I may have got it wrong, apologies if I did and please correct me!

[Tosh]

Originally posted by alcapone


As far as I know this is how it is in England, but I practice WTF and am not a member of either of these associations so I may have got it wrong, apologies if I did and please correct me!

Errr, concerning the UKTA you are way off base! The UKTA was founded by (now) Grandmaster Rhee Ki Ha, a Korean, so I think you are a little, i.e. way :D, off base there. :D

I'm interested where you got your information from though?? You train anywhere near Oxford Uni? :D The UKTA has always been predominantly ITF based. It has been affiliated to the ITF since it's inception in 1967 to my knowledge. We practice the "Blue Cottage" set of patterns as laid out by General Choi and follow General Choi's syllabus as laid out in the encyclopedia.

I think that makes us (really) ITF!! :D :D D

[alcapone]

Tosh - Errr, concerning the UKTA you are way off base! The UKTA was founded by (now) Grandmaster Rhee Ki Ha, a Korean, so I think you are a little, i.e. way , off base there.

Errr, OK, maybe it was founded by a Korean, but British guys run it maybe? I just heard that was what happened, like I said I didn't know for sure but I have a friend who was a memebr of the UKTA many years ago, and he's the one who told me, maybe he'd just had too much to drink!! I did say it was based on ITF by the way! ;o)

I don't train anywhere near Oxford Uni, I live in Oxford therefore go no where near Oxford Uni students (everyone in Oxford dislikes the Uni students, something about them being arrogant etc!) Unless you meant Brookes uni????? Why you ask?

[alcapone]

Just looked at the UKTA website, does seem very ITF, must have just heard wrong! Am I right about the TAGB though? It must be that association that is run by British people and has it's own style, but based on ITF? Holgate is that right?

[Tosh]

Originally posted by alcapone
Unless you meant Brookes uni????? Why you ask?

Makes sense. There an excellent club there (Oxford uni) run by Master G Miller VII, the UKTA Chief Umpire. JUst checkin why so ill-informed.

Chinesey whispers alwayd cause problems :D Grandmaster Rhee still conducts seminars and area gradings up and down the country on a regular basis :D

I should know I was at one last week!!! :D

[alcapone]

Tosh- There an excellent club there (Oxford uni) run by Master G Miller VII, the UKTA Chief Umpire. JUst checkin why so ill-informed.

I know, thought of joining it originally, but decided against it, they don't train during the uni holidays so it's not much good to me, didn't know it was UKTA though.....learn a new thing every day! I stand corrected, still wondering about TAGB though?

[Holgate]

TAGB is british run, but it is still ITF based, we still do the same patterns as the UKTA because on a couple of occassions the two groups have come together in cross competitions and although I am not sure which way around but I believe the TAGB came out of UKTA orgionally many years back (20 years) and from the TAGB came PUMA who went back to a strong identifiable like with ITF.

Nationally the chairman of the TAGB is Master Dave Oliver with Master Mike Dew as vice chair and I do not believe there is one korean involved with the TAGB at the top level, which I have to say is a shame. So yep it could indeed be the only fully british run TKD group in the UK, although I could be wrong.

I have found the TAGB more willing to cross over and try out the WTF form of sparring, where as UKTA generally will avoid it.

Not being disrespectful to the UKTA as a whole but I have found their school in Exeter to be a touch lacking, I have observed a couple of their classes and was dissapointed to find that Black belts were unable to spar properly for their grade and had all but forgotten the lower grade patterns. I hope this is just one school.

[neryo_tkd]

thanx for the information guys.

so i wasn't properly informed. i am glad to have found out the truth.

[Tosh]

Originally posted by Holgate

Not being disrespectful to the UKTA as a whole but I have found their school in Exeter to be a touch lacking......I hope this is just one school.

However, we both know that to judge an association on one club (or even it's students) would be foolish!!! Don't we?? :D

I'm sure there are many below average TAGB clubs (keeping my mouth shut :D ) and there are below average PUMA clubs as there are below average WTF clubs as there are below average ITA clubs as there are below average GTF clubs........... you see a pattern forming here right???

This sort of comment is neither constructive nor welcome! :D

My momma had a saying,

"If you aint got anything good to say......"

You know the rest! ;)

[Holgate]

If you read what I am saying carefully I am not judging a whole orginisation on one club, I am saying that it is a shame that one club comes across as week when the orginisation as a whole may be a very strong one. I would hope those outside of TKD in my area wouldn't judge the art as a whole just on that one club because of course there are stronger clubs.

TAGB wise I personally feel my club is stronger than that of many others within my area and across the country, but then people look for diffrent things in their clubs, some want a laxer atmosphere and they thrive in it and others want a more military disipline, which I personally do well in.

I guess it comes down to me expecting everyone else to reach my standards where as clubs should just reach the standards of their indivduals.

[Tosh]

Originally posted by Holgate
If you read what I am saying carefully

I did. But you agree it's not really bringing anything helpful to the discussion is it? :D I mean why did you need to feel the need to put down another club at all?? It's attitudes like this which cause political splits and disharmony in the first place, when we should be striving to work with (not against) each other.

TAGB wise I personally feel my club is stronger than that of many others within my area and across the country,

Yeah, yeah... and my Dad is bigger than your Dad!!! :D

[tkd ajumma]

In my quest to find a new club in England when I move there at Christmas, I have been doing a bit of research on the net, and the number of acronyms out there is enough to give anyone a headache.

Judging by the amount of information about ITF and WTF available on the net, it definitely seems like there are a lot more ITF clubs around, but they don't all seem to agree on what is true ITF. In the smallish town near where I will be living, there are at least 2 ITF clubs, affiliated to different organisations. It just makes me think it's best to rely on your own impressions of individual clubs and instructors, rather than getting too hung up on what organisations they are affiliated to.

But having said that, I thought I’d summarise what I found about UK taekwondo organisations. See if you can stay awake until the end, here goes.....

UK Sport (UK Sports Council) is the government agency responsible for developing sport in the UK. It distributes funding to over 50 governing bodies of sport, one of which is the British Tae Kwon Do Council (BTC). The BTC consists of 11 different organisations, including :

1. The TAGB (Taekwondo Association of Great Britain) http://www.tagb.biz, formed in 1983 as a result of the failure of attempts to unite WTF and ITF. The TAGB is a member of Tae-Kwon-Do International, a worldwide body formed in 1993 encompassing both ITF and WTF stylists. http://www.tkdi.biz

2. The British Taekwondo Control Board (BTCB) (WTF) http://www.btcb.org is the only British body officially recognised for WTF and Olympic taekwondo within the BTC.

3. UKTA (United Kingdom Taekwon-do Association) http://www.ukta.com (ITF) was formed in 1967 by Rhee Ki Ha and was the first tkd governing body in UK.

4. UKGT (United Kingdom Global Tae Kwon Do) (ITF) (couldn’t find much about this one)

5. Taekwondo Chungdokwan Great Britain (WTF) http://www.chungdokwan.org.uk

I also found these other organisations listed, but I don’t know which, if any, are members of BTC:

British Taekwondo Union

UKTF (United Kingdom Taekwon-Do Federation) (ITF) 1987
www.itf-taekwondo.co.uk

BUTF (British United Taekwondo Federation) (ITF)
www.butf.com

Global Taekwon-Do International (UK) www.gti-taekwondo.com (ITF)

[mattsylvester]

Hi all,

Originally posted by tkd ajumma

1. The TAGB (Taekwondo Association of Great Britain) http://www.tagb.biz, formed in 1983 as a result of the failure of attempts to unite WTF and ITF. The TAGB is a member of Tae-Kwon-Do International, a worldwide body formed in 1993 encompassing both ITF and WTF stylists. http://www.tkdi.biz


This utilizes hip twist and not sine wave. They do the Chang Hun patterns though so ITF-based.

2. The British Taekwondo Control Board (BTCB) (WTF) http://www.btcb.org is the only British body officially recognised for WTF and Olympic taekwondo within the BTC.

As stated not ITF based.

3. UKTA (United Kingdom Taekwon-do Association) http://www.ukta.com (ITF) was formed in 1967 by Rhee Ki Ha and was the first tkd governing body in UK.

Very much ITF down to the sine wave.

4. UKGT (United Kingdom Global Tae Kwon Do) (ITF) (couldn’t find much about this one)

Never heard of these guys.

5. Taekwondo Chungdokwan Great Britain (WTF) http://www.chungdokwan.org.uk

WTF based.

UKTF (United Kingdom Taekwon-Do Federation) (ITF) 1987
www.itf-taekwondo.co.uk

*Think* they're hip twist.

BUTF (British United Taekwondo Federation) (ITF)
www.butf.com

*Think* they're sine wave.

Global Taekwon-Do International (UK) www.gti-taekwondo.com (ITF)


TAGB breakaways. Hip twist.

UTAW - Gary Gassor's lot, hip twist. TAGB breakaways.

UTAE - Broke away from TAGB, also link to Gary Gassor

Practical TKD - Hip twist, linked to the ADK as well.

Hope this helps muddy the waters a bit more.

There are also loads of independant schools here as well.