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Finlay
Finlay's picture
Jumping in the patterns

Does anyone have ideas on applications on the jumping in the patterns . I mean other than what is put forward in the mainstream which is generally about jumping over obstacles or kicks.

i am referring mainly to

The jumping back fist in Yul Gok,

could this be a response to your arm being caught and pulled?

The jump for height in Toi Gye , landing in a pressing x-block,

This could be a follow up to the previous motion, it being applied as a leg catch

or if you want to get fancy, jumping on to opponent for a standing anaconda :)

Finally the 360 jump from U-shape block ( or C-shape :)) to knife hand guarding block, 

again could this be a response to a grab or take down attempt?

any thoughts on this?

Th0mas
Th0mas's picture

In "traditional" karate kata, one school of though is that the jump emphasises either a throw or a massive drop of weight to apply body mass to an application.

However as forms have developed over time in many cases it is all about the performance... I suspect that the latter is true for a lot of TKD forms, but that may be my bias as I am not a Korean stylist :-)

Th0mas
Th0mas's picture

I thought my previous response was a little too glib... So if you look at Toi Gye (all be it, a form with a number of familiar movements from a range of karate kata) and the jump to which you refer, it looks like the follow through from a throw.

The previous technique (a "double block" - apologies I don't know TKD term) could essentially be a grab and lift, followed by a dump. Your right hand goes between the legs and left arm around the neck of your opponent, lift with the right and pull down with the left. The jump helps to jerk your opponent off their feet, supported by the turn for additional unbalancing. You then dump your opponent and follow up with a finishing punch with your full body mass, whilst your opponent is on their back on the ground. :-)

I hope that illustrates my previous point.

Iain Abernethy
Iain Abernethy's picture

Th0mas wrote:
In "traditional" karate kata, one school of though is that the jump emphasises either a throw or a massive drop of weight to apply body mass to an application.

Definitely something I have heard too. From my perspective it’s not something I believe to be universally valid though. The reason being that we have load of throwing techniques shown where there is no jump. For example:

I therefore think we need to look at each case on its own merits, and also accept that some jumps are there because they look cool / add to physically difficulty. For example, the jump in Pinan Godan is not found in every version of the kata. Some just lift the leg, like in this example from Katsuya Miyahira (student of Choshin Chibana and Choki Motobu).

You see the lack of a jump here too:

So not all groups jump. I think the jump on that sequence was added as an “athletic augmentation” along with such things as very deep stances, high kicks etc. My prefered bunkai for that sequence has the “jump” as a leg-lift:

That’s not to say that’s the case for all jumps. I think some can have direct functional use. Such as this example from Enpi / Wanshu:

The “Chinte Hops” would be another example of how the jumps can be used to shock load the elbow:

The bottom line is I think that each jump needs to be looked at in the context in which it is presented and I’d caution against the application of a “universal rule”. There are throws with no jump; there are jumps that are athletic not pragmatic; and there are jumps that serve differing purposes i.e. “bronco kicking” (the term used for jumping and driving the heels of your boots into a fallen enemy in old British and US military combatives), the shock loading of joints, etc.

All the best,

Iain

Gavin J Poffley
Gavin J Poffley's picture

 there are jumps that serve differing purposes i.e. “bronco kicking” (the term used for jumping and driving the heels of your boots into a fallen enemy in old British and US military combatives)

A while back I made a joke to one of my dojo mates that the hops for Chinte could perhaps be "Jumping up and down on the corpses!" but it seems this may not be too far from the truth after all! 

Iain Abernethy
Iain Abernethy's picture

Gavin J Poffley wrote:
A while back I made a joke to one of my dojo mates that the hops for Chinte could perhaps be "Jumping up and down on the corpses!"

I’ve heard hoping over bodies of your fallen enemies put forward in all seriousness … still we solider on ;-)

Th0mas
Th0mas's picture

Hi Iain

I agree, as always context is everything. What I think can probably be said for definite  is that the jump is not about avoiding an attack from a sword or leaping to kick someone off a horse... Then again the exceptions can prove the rule :-)

cheers

Tom

Iain Abernethy
Iain Abernethy's picture

Th0mas wrote:
What I think can probably be said for definite is that the jump is not about avoiding an attack from a sword or leaping to kick someone off a horse...

I did a full podcast based on the ridiculousness of jumping to avoid a sword :-)

http://www.iainabernethy.co.uk/article/occams-hurdled-katana-logic-kata-application

As for kicking someone off a horse … to hit someone on horseback in the chest would require a leaping sidekick which would have the person higher than the current world high-up record! And that’s assuming the horse is still and not charging toward you ;-) It amazes me that myth persists.

That’s not to say Chick Norris can’t pull off the modern day equivalent :-)

All the best,

Iain

Tau
Tau's picture

If I may act as a translater of sorts, being Dan graded in both TKD and Karate and as someone who sees the TKD patterns as essentially just jumbled up Karate kata:

Finlay wrote:
The jumping back fist in Yul Gok,

At the risk of appearing pedantic or over-precise, this is less a "jump" and more a "skip" akin to the movement found in Heian Godan BEFORE the main jump. So seek out applications to that.

Finlay wrote:
The jump for height in Toi Gye , landing in a pressing x-block,

Stolen from Heian Godan. I see Iain has linked to a video :-)

Finlay wrote:
Finally the 360 jump from U-shape block ( or C-shape :)) to knife hand guarding block, 

From Chung Moo? Stolen from Empi/Wanshu. See Iain's video.

If you don't possess them already, I advise you to purchase Iain's Bunkai Jitsu Volume 1 DVD for principles and Stuart Anslows Ch'ang Hon Taekwon-do Hae Sul book for TKD specifics

Kevin73
Kevin73's picture

I have read from one high ranking Shotokan person (Yokota Sensei in "Shotokan Mysteries") that the real reason for the hops in Chinte kata is nothing more than an over emphasis on "embusen" so you end up in the same spot you started in.  Although many many people have tried to find applications for the hops.

Iain Abernethy
Iain Abernethy's picture

Kevin73 wrote:
I have read from one high ranking Shotokan person (Yokota Sensei in "Shotokan Mysteries") that the real reason for the hops in Chinte kata is nothing more than an over emphasis on "embusen" so you end up in the same spot you started in.  Although many many people have tried to find applications for the hops.

I think that’s likely to be true and I was unaware of that being expressed in that book you mention. Thanks for sharing.

Shotokan has the stated goal of always starting and finishing on the same point … and there alternate versions of Chinte where there are no finishing hops. So it seems to me it is very likely they have been added in to fulfil this Shotokan rule. In the video above I state this 8 seconds in. I also state that we can’t be 100% sure that that is the case though, because it is possible the hops were always present in the version of the form adopted into Shotokan; although personally I think it’s more likely they were added because of the Shotokan dictate that all kata must start and finish on the same place.

Either way, I think it’s right to analyse the possibility they were always there and keep anything found to have a practical function. From there, irrespective of whether the hops were there at first or not, we have shock-loading the joints (or an alternative but equally fictional interpretation) as part of our modern version of the “Chinte Fighting System”.

It all comes down to whether we approach karate as an Historian (“My main goal is to replicate what they did in the past as an accurately as possible”) or a Pragmatist (“My aim is to practise a karate that is functional as possible in the modern day”). Perhaps paradoxically, all the past masters were Pragmatists as none passed on karate entirely unaltered and exactly as it was taught to them.

So I personally would have no issue with people using the Chinto hops pragmatically, even if they may have been added to the kata for aesthetic reasons. They would be “historically inaccurate” but “functionally valid”.

To give a more common example of this process, roundhouse kick is part of pretty much every karate dojos practise … but it is not an “historically accurate” technique.

All the best,

Iain

Tigger TSD
Tigger TSD's picture

Hello I am new to the Forum. I study Tang Soo Do and we do a form called Sip Soo. Where there is a huge jump where you have jump two stances in to what I can only describe is an H like block. I was wondering if anyone knew of a reasonable application or this move. This is the best video I could find on YouTube, he is not the best practitioner of the form, but you can get the idea.If you want me to post a better video I can make one myself for you

Th0mas
Th0mas's picture

The kata that is being performed is Jitte. The jump in question does not appear in the shotokan version.

Although there are some good "empty hand" applications demonstrated for this kata, personally I think originally it was a Bo-staff kata. The form lends itself to disarming an attacker with a bo. I think that is where you need to look for the correct context of the applications.

Iain Abernethy
Iain Abernethy's picture

Tigger TSD wrote:
Hello I am new to the Forum. I study Tang Soo Do and we do a form called Sip Soo. Where there is a huge jump where you have jump two stances in to what I can only describe is an H like block. I was wondering if anyone knew of a reasonable application or this move.

Th0mas wrote:
The kata that is being performed is Jitte. The jump in question does not appear in the shotokan version.

Thomas is right that it is a variation on Jitte. The jump does not appear in the version of the form I practise either. Here is the Shotokan version:

As you can see no jump.

Here is the Shito-Ryu version. Again, there is no jump.

The Wado-Ryu version is below and again there is no jump:

The logical assumption would be that the jump has no function and has been added for aesthetic and athletic purposes. So long as we accept that, there is no problem performing the form that way and then drilling the applications without the jump. It’s then like the “Pinan Godan” jump discussed above.

As regards bunkai of the kata (minus the jump) here is myself performing the bunkai in a two-person drill. The “h-block” is shown at 50 seconds.

All the best,

Iain

Marc
Marc's picture

What do you think? Could a jump be counted as another kind of stance?

Stances, as we know, can be ways to encode body weight shifting in kata. Zenkutsu-dachi (bending forward stance) tells us to thrust our body weight forward. Kiba-dachi (horse riding stance) tells us to drop our body weight. Other stances can be read similarly.

Could a jump (or simply a quickly assumed erect posture) then be interpreted as thrusting your body weight upwards, making it the opposite of a kiba-dachi so to speak?

Of course what goes up must come down, so dropping your body weight after the jump comes naturally.

I agree that we have to look at each jump in every kata in context. But I feel that reading a jump as vertically shifting your body weight often leads to good results.  

Tigger TSD
Tigger TSD's picture

Thank you so much. this has been very educational. The Shotokan version seemed to have a skip in it which seemed the most similar. I agree that the Korean versions are very stylised compared to the Japanese versions you have demonstrated. Also thanks for the application video. I have never seen any of those applications for the form before. Most likely alot of the questions I ask about my TSD forms will have the answer "it's done to look cool" answer. But i'm very interested in the individual apllications of every movement of every form I do. It is not practiced nearly enough in my style and I like your approach to the forms. So once again thank you. 

DaveB
DaveB's picture
Tigger TSD wrote:

Thank you so much. this has been very educational. The Shotokan version seemed to have a skip in it which seemed the most similar. I agree that the Korean versions are very stylised compared to the Japanese versions you have demonstrated. Also thanks for the application video. I have never seen any of those applications for the form before. Most likely alot of the questions I ask about my TSD forms will have the answer "it's done to look cool" answer. But i'm very interested in the individual apllications of every movement of every form I do. It is not practiced nearly enough in my style and I like your approach to the forms. So once again thank you. 

As a Tang Soo Do man you're actually best placed of all the TKD stylists because as you see above, your forms are just variations on Shotokan kata. And Shotokan is a very accessible and well documented karate style.

The Jitte move mentioned above is performed using a normal side step. In context of a single kata (fighting system) it illustrates the type of footwork for a certain circumstance.

The step is in horseriding stance which is strong sideways suggesting targets in that direction. Sideways facing stances limit your ability to engage all limbs but present a smaller range of targets. This implies use of distance rather than close range techniques, hence the stepping.

From one side you advance a short sharp quick step and swing the fist up, most likely intercepting the motion of an assailant trying to cover the gap. From the other side you retreat with a short step tacking the added momentum out of the enemies rush. You either block a deep attack, maintaining the gap, or strike the incoming attacker, possibly using the rear hand to pull his attack past you.

This technique follows a full cross step-step out, also supporting the idea of working distance. It's through examination of the strengths and weaknesses of movements and positions in context with surrounding techniques that your forms will open up for you, but don't be afraid to compare versions as I tend to see only variations on the same theme most of the time.

Lastly try not to get bogged down in application. Set piece drills develop skills, but making use of kata for me requires understanding why it's there. For example the above application is about cutting off an advance by shifting into it. What you hit with when you intercept is not as important as ensuring that your structure and body weight are behind it. These are the oft talked about principles behind the former and they are what we fight with when we need to.

On a side note, the act of jumping its self can have useful applications. Removing friction for turning and spinning techniques as well as regaining balance come to mind.

Finlay
Finlay's picture

Hi

If I may be so bold After thinking about it for a while I'd like to offer an alternative application for the 360 jump found in choong moo/wanshu

The previous movement, u-shape block, we can take as loading the opponent on to the shoulders in order to throw them. If we attempt this and it is counteracted, or we just fail. We are in a fairly bad position with us almost underneath the opponent.

The jump could be an escape from that position after a failed throw. To follow Iain and try to explain as many parts of the movement as possible...

- we jump as a fast a strong reaction to being under our opponent.

- the knife hand block is there to clear any arms that many be searching for grabs

- we spin in the jump, towards the back because that is where the opponent is standing.

As for a full 360, I think it just makes the pattern neater.

I hope this is clear enough I welcome any feedback on this :)

Evening artist
Evening artist's picture

Hi All,

First post for me in the forums, but I thought I would put in my two penneth worth, on what is now an old post.

Anyway:

Finlay wrote:
The jumping back fist in Yul Gok

I consider this to be the first half of an Ippon Seoi Nage throw (the backfist is grabbing the arm of the attacker), the second half being the turn into double forearm block (the actual throw). Hope this makes sense!

The movement reminded me of how the judo guys used to practice ippon seio nage and the turn into the next move suggested a throw.

Hope this helps