 Taekwondo is one of the most common martial arts day when it comes to sports. And unfortunately with that comes a ton of criticism usually stemming from its point-based sparring to not being grounded in real fighting. It's also often disregarded as ineffective in an MMA ring until all of a sudden it is. So today's question is just how relevant is Taekwondo in MMA? By now most of you have probably already seen that beautiful UFC knockout by Joaquin Buckley on October 10th. It was a gorgeous finish and it quickly became one of the most talked about knockouts of the year. So we thought that this would be a good example of Taekwondo in MMA. Now earlier this year we did an episode looking at the pros and cons and the differences between traditional martial arts and mixed martial arts. And when we talk about mixed martial arts in this context we're usually referring to the paradigm of the UFC or other similar MMA sporting events. So that link is in the description below. If you haven't seen it yet I highly encourage it because one of our missions on this channel is to bring about a bunch of different martial artists together and respect each other and I want to erase that division that sharp division that we often see between mixed martial artists and traditional martial artists because the truth of the matter is they really do depend on each other and we want to blur in the lines of that discrimination. And one of the most common remarks that accompanies that debate is usually it'll never work in the ring. Kempo, Karate, Taekwondo it'll never work in the ring. I can see the reason of this comment at face value. An MMA fighter usually has multiple disciplines under their belts. They train for a knockout full contact and a lot of pressure testing is involved. So sure an individual art is not likely to fare well in the ring especially if that person has not gone through the harsh regiment and training that an MMA fighter typically goes through. Now my Kempo was background and I'll be the first one to admit that if you took a Kempo only martial artist plucked him from the dojo and dropped him in the UFC ring he's going to get rocked he's going to get rocked fast. But to be fair if you take a Brazilian Jiu Jitsu only practitioner with no other arts mixed in plucked him from their dojo and throw him in the ring they're not likely to fare much better either. The key to mixed martial arts is exactly that in that they're mixed. You know a fighter's going to take multiple disciplines and pluck the best techniques from each one and put together a blend and pressure test it to see what's effective and what they can personally pull off in the ring. So take that same Kempo guy give him some boxing give him some grappling and put him through the same regiment of continuous sparring and some pressure testing and all of a sudden you've got somebody who's going to fare a little bit better in that ring. I personally have a tremendous amount of respect for anybody who gets in fights inside that ring it takes a strong constitution to do that. My former instructor taught a lot of local MMA guys and I did get this opportunity to spar with a lot of them and while sometimes I was able to hold my own just fine I know and I'll be the first to admit that I'm not going to last very long against them in that ring at least not without going through the major regiment and training that they did. So when somebody says oh if karate or taekwondo are so good how can we never see it in the ring well you do you see it all the time you just have to know what to look for. Now you're never going to see a Kempo self-defense technique play out in the ring that's not what they're meant for and quite honestly that's the topic we want to put in the table for another day but for someone who's in Kempo will recognize foot maneuvers body checks and signature strikes and quite honestly that goes for a lot of different martial arts you know someone in shodokan is going to see and recognize shodokan techniques and we also covered that topic in shodokan and MMA and I've included a link for that below as well I think it's worth to watch it's a great point of discussion but when it comes to taekwondo that criticism is a little bit baffling because it tends to stand out when it's used in the ring and it's used a lot so first let's look at a few reasons why taekwondo would not be effective in an MMA competition and then we're going to look at some reasons why it could be and actually is the first thing to consider is one there are many different versions and types of taekwondo and we're not going to go into the differences today but they range from anywhere from you know full contact more realistic fighting to what we see you know in the olympic what many people considered watered down karate but you know it doesn't really matter the difference right now we don't have to get into that because today's comments really apply to taekwondo on the whole and that brings us into the next point of contention which is exactly that points point-based sparring and competition is often looked down upon in MMA circles mainly because it's not based in actual realistic fighting and that's a fair critique because when it comes to a real-life fight it's not point-based neither opponent is going to stop and reset after landing the hit no near hits count and in many times the person who lands the most hits isn't necessarily the one who wins the fight so correct that type of fighting style does not fit the paradigm of a realistic fight another criticism is in that many taekwondo competitions there's a severe limit on what you do in terms of your hands like striking with the hands and hand techniques so fighters are mainly limited to just kicks which honestly ignores a whole regiment of fighting on its own and there are also often restrictions on takedowns and leg kicking as well and because of that lack of hand striking you often see competitors with their hands out at their sides and they're bouncing around a lot when it comes to real-life fight one of the last things you want to do is keep your hands down at your side like that and finally which is related to the point aspect of the match is that many times in taekwondo competitions it's light to medium contact you know the goal is to score points it's not always to knock out the opponent so if you're going to look at taekwondo in this perspective of course it's not going to work in MMA you can't just take one of these competitors and drop them in the ring and expect them to last well it's you know it's a valid point in that context but honestly it's not really a fair comparison because you're looking at two completely different styles of competition two different sports two different rule sets it's like complaining that baseball players don't tackle the runners like they do in football you know two different sports two sets of rules but now let's look at the other side of the coin and take a look at the taekwondo one and analyze why the techniques could be and are effective in an MMA fight it goes back to having that mix of arts generally speaking a single art regardless of the art is not going to fare well in the ring even high-end grapplers need to add boxing or some sort of striking art to round themselves out of it in fact taekwondo is one of the most common arts to find in the mix fighters regimen so why is that exactly what is it about taekwondo that makes it such an asset in MMA well the first thing we can do is let's take one of its perceived weaknesses and turn it into a strength in taekwondo most competitions you've got limited hand strikes you can't do takedowns you can't do leg kicks there's no knees there's no elbows so when you take all that away what is there left to do kick and what happens when kicking is all you can do you learn to kick really well taekwondo practitioners have some of the fastest sharpest and often sneakiest kicks in the martial arts they're also incredibly accurate a well executed taekwondo kick will pinpoint its target and just because someone does point fighting does not mean they can't deliver power with those kicks i've sparred many men and women in taekwondo that have had some serious explosive energy and for someone who trains primarily in kicking knows how to gauge distance very well in fact i would go so far suggest that the advantage of controlling distance between opponents would be on their side because it pretty much dictates the tactics and techniques that they would use and if they're fighting somebody who does not have taekwondo experience then many times they can deliver kicks and combinations that the other person wouldn't expect or literally see coming i agree someone who only does taekwondo is not going to fare well in the ring but you give them equal training in boxing and grappling and all of a sudden those taekwondo kicks are going to blend in quite nicely but in the interest of fairness i believe the reverse is also true take that MMA guy limit his punches take away his knees his elbows his takedowns his leg kicks and full contact and put them in a taekwondo competition and suddenly now the advantage is on the taekwondo side you know context is everything so we see taekwondo in an MMA fighters arsenal all the time and it's pretty distinct compared to moitai and other kicking arts that are also common moitai is awesome and it is designed to break you you know generally speaking the kicks are back leg focus for power and you see less chambering because that's because a moitai kick isn't intended to make contact and retract but rather go through the target you know those kicks are for breaking the legs and the body and delivering devastating and crushing blows taekwondo kicks are usually focused on speed and precision and also you see a tighter chambering action which helps this practitioner redirect a kick or set up a series of follow-ups and then you've got the front leg taekwondo practitioners are really good with their front leg and many times they can generate more power with their lead leg than moitai practitioners can so add in those signature spinning combinations the hooked and angle kicks and that sheer speed and precision and you have a pretty effective kicking regimen i personally believe to be a well-rounded fighter you need focus training on hand strikes kicks takedowns and grappling if you can solidify all four of those aspects you will be a serious contender and if you get something like boss ruten who's got extensive experience in taekwondo moitai kickboxing and kyokushin karate well then have fun with that so for all the criticism the taekwondo gets it's kind of funny because when we do see a beautiful knockout like we just saw that's all everybody talks about and it goes viral so you know taekwondo is front and center in MMA you just have to take the moment to notice it so i want to finish off this topic by paraphrasing something that joe rogan said he said that in taekwondo without the takedowns and punches to the face and leg kicks and all of that they are forced to develop effective kicking under those parameters and making those kick techniques work and they can still work great but the reason that taekwondo would suffer in the ring is because they don't have the defense of all the other parameters once they can mix in the other attributes along with their kicks then you have a serious contender he also said that he believes the best way to learn those kicks is actually in the taekwondo vacuum you know not why you're trying to learn grappling and hand striking at the same time but learn with the restrictions that they have and then make the techniques work under those conditions and do the same thing with boxing and grappling and learn them individually and make them solid and then you will be a serious contender i think that's pretty solid advice so what are the best taekwondo techniques that you have seen or maybe even pulled off yourself in an MMA match let us know in the comments below thanks for watching and we'll see you next week