Grading on 29th October 2006

Dear All,

There will be a Taekwondo Grading held at Taman Jurong CC on 29th October from 10am. We have invited Mr. Kelvin Lee from ACE Insurance to give us a special talk on Taekwondo Insurance during the grading.

All students are reminded to be in proper Taekwondo attire. Failure to do so would result in automatic failure.

Cheers. :)

Map of Taman Jurong CC:



Bus from Lakeside MRT: 98

It’s finally over…

The 33rd Pesta Sukan has finally come to an end at 7:30pm, Singapore time on 27th August 2006. After four days of grueling fights and pool of blood spattered, the tournament closed with deserving winners awarded with their prize.

I had the honor to referee two of three final bouts last night. The feeling was exhilarating; the last time I felt so good was exactly the same time last year where I refereed all the final bouts of the 32nd Pesta Sukan. This could be the credit of the pair of RED shoes I was wearing.

As a national referee refereeing for the national tournament, there is no room for mistakes. With the intense pressure from the audience, you are required to conduct the games fairly, awarding the penalties and points impartially.

Into my second year of refereeing, I can only say that the feeling of being a referee for the matches is much better than the feeling of the participating players. This is because I stay in control of the matches. 

I would strongly urge those who have not taken the National Referee Course offered by STF to quickly sign up and join the team of elite national referees immediately.

Cheers!

Pesta Sukan 2006

This is my second year in refereeing and my 2nd yr in a row refereeing for the national championship. The feeling is exhilarating. There are a few interesting events that happened during the first 2 days at the nationals.

Day 1, Saturday 12 August (6 Hours)

With only one participant from my club today, both my partner and me volunteered to referee for the whole day. Same time last year, i was busy running up and down the courts, refereeing the matches one after another. Today, i sat all the time behind the recorders' desk, tabulating the results of the match.

The consolation came when my student won the bronze medal in his category of competition.

Day 2, Sunday 13 August (9 Hours)

Today, i have no participants for the competition, so i volunteered to referee the whole day again. Of the 9 hours in refereeing, i only managed to referee 2 matches worth 20mins; the rest of the time i was again behind the recorders' desk, tabulating results of the matches.

The lottery draw for the day was the highlight. Our new t-shirt design is represented with numerical of "5717 3770". These numbers came up in the starter position as "5771" & "7073". I called my partner to congratulate him but the sad thing is that we did not buy the winning permutations of these numbers. Sigh....

Pesta Sukan T-Shirt Design

How do you find this?

Presbyterian High Taekwondo Challenge Cup

I was invited to referee for this event on 23 July 2006. It's been a long time since I last officially refereed a Taekwondo tournament. Presbyterian High Taekwondo Challenge Cup is a sanctioned sparring competition where seven schools in Singapore participated.

I happen to bump into one of my students from Monday class who represented his school, Regent Sec, to participate in the Speed Kicking event. If I did not remember wrongly, I think he received a Silver medal for that event.  Congratulations!

One thing that touched me most is the fact that I was honoured to be the Centre Referee for the last bout. It brought back great memories where I was awarded the Best Referee in 2005; i was also the Centre Referee for the finals in Pesta Sukan 2005 (National Championships). Being one of the most inexperienced to acheieve such an award is the best encouragement anyone could get.

This year, one of my trainees will be attending the TKD Referee Course conducted by STF. With Pesta Sukan 2006 round the corner, I would like to encourage him to compete and win the Best Referee 2006 title. At the same time, I would like all my readers to support him in spirit. 

Cheers,

Calvin Ng

For Passion or for Money?

Haha.. someone left the following comments:

"Just a question, Do you teach Taekwondo for profit or it's the passion that drive you to teach."

The following is my answer to the great chap who asked me the above question:

This is the biggest challenge i faced running the club. Money. Can any organisation be runned without cashflow? the answer is NO. But am i teaching Taekwondo for profit? You can judge for yourself....

For one semester, 3 months, the charges are S$45.00 per student. This works out to be S$15.00 per month. Rental of premise for class is 35% of the fees collected, excluding admin and equipment costs. The remaining is shared by two instructors.

65% of S$15.oo per month = S$9.75 per month.

One month = 4 week @ 2hours each = 8 hours per month.

Profit per hour = S$9.75 / 8 = S$1.22 per hour.

Profit for one instructor = S$1.22 / 2 = S$0.61 per hour.

Now, can anyone tell me is this for profit? :) You decide......

Mistake

Sigh, big mistake. Just wanted to make things more simple for the students to remember their poomses. but incidentally confused myself of the steps.... sigh... my apologises to them, so sorry.

Cheers,

Coach Calvin

Final Design... :)

This is the "Chosen" one. :)

There will be a slight variation. I am looking at having individual names customized on each of the tshirt to make it more personalized. Cost is expexted to be between S$15 - S$20. Will have a sample ready soon.

4 Additional Designs...

New T-shirt Designs

Difference between STA & STF

There have been alot said about STA vs STF. Frankly, i can only remember vaguely what their differences are. :)

As you would have remembered, i wrote in my earlier blog that i start my training in TKD with STA (Singapore Taekwondo Academy, affiliate to International Taekwondo Federation a.k.a. ITF). In 1998, due to some undisclosed issues, the community club hosting our activity decided to convert our training programme from STA to STF style. There rest is history....

Differences.... in Style:

The poomsae practiced by STA is the "Hyung" style. Movement are slower, looks more like a traditional dance steps. The emphasis on "qi" control is very prominent with trainees wheezing out "zzz" sound for every move they make. There are altogether 10 patterns from white belt to black belt.

The poomsae practiced by STF is the "Taeguek" style. More dynamic than the "Hyung" style, each step is quick and swift. Focus is on each defensive & offensive execution less the "zzz" sound. Similarly, there are 10 paaterns to reach black belt, with the first 2 sets "made in Singapore".

Differences.... in Uniform:

The uniform worned by STA resembles the traditional dress worn by the ancient dynasties (similar to uniforms worn by karatedo, hapkido) where the front flab of the uniform overlaps one another. The STA emblem is on the left chest area, while a chinese charater "Zheng" is placed on the right chest of the uniform.

The uniform worn by STF practicioners are more convenient as it can be slipped on like a tshirt. Instead of a STF emblem, we have individual club logos on the left chest area.

Differences.... in Fighting Style:

STA emphasis that TKD is an art, hence traditional methods of combat are employed. You will not see alot of dynamism in their sparring, but plain, simple and beautiful yet powerful moves floors the opponents. Respect for opponents is greatly emphasized.

In contrast, STF exponents loves to do things real quick; you will see no less than 2 combination of kicks and punches in each attack. Accuracy is the least of concerns when highly trained practitioners knocks their opponents out with their speedy attacks. It is highly regarded as a sport rather than an art, which i felt its morality can be improved.

Having been trained in both martial art forms for the last 14 years, i am confident that i am able to blend the differences and nurture a better group of martial artists via Stiletto TKD.

:)

Yet another low turn out..

Today is another poor turn out. Attendance of Monday class at 40%. I am really curious what actually happened to the rest of the class. sigh....

I guess it is only plain courtesy to inform the instructors if you are not coming for class.

Nights. :(

One week has passed....

Its been a week since the uneventful 8th May. Let's hope we can start the training on time today.

As we are gearing up for the national tournament in August 06, i would be blogging the training schedule in this blog on every Monday before the class begins.

15 May 2006, Monday

8:00pm - 8:15pm Self Warm-up & Stretching
8:15pm - 8:45pm 20 Suicides + 10 x 4 Aerobics Push-ups
8:45pm - 9:15pm Pattern Training (New pattern)
9:15pm - 9:30pm Break
9:30pm - 10:00pm Basic Kicking

See you at the Basketball court near block 323. Cheers... :)

Monday Training

Very disappointed with the trainees today. There were only 4 students present; so much for wanting to achieve more (as per a student's special request and ironically, he did not turn up).

Too frustrated to write more. Good night. :(

Black Belt Club

Today, i went to Jalan Besar CC for pattern (poomse) training. There were some revision of the patterns thus David invited me to join him to train with the rest of the black belts in the Black Belt club. The training was conducted by Master Chin Kee Shin, chief grader of STF grading department.

After a short warm-up routine, we proceed to watch some pattern DVDs from Korea. Grandmaster Lee was featured in the video demostrating the various patterns and area where most practitioners make mistakes. After the video, we proceeded to do hands-on.

We went through the patterns beginning with Taeguek Il-Jang till poomse Koryo. With Master Chin, Master Sam Tan was there as well to coach all of us and fine-tune our moves. The feeling of being a student again is really funny. Got alot of getting used-to to do. :)

Wishing you all a great week ahead!

Stiletto T-Shirt

While sleeping yesterday night, i received an SMS from one of my trainees (he is serving the country currently) asking me the progress of our club T-Shirt. Just like everyone, i am very excited about the new club T-shirt; i wish to own it very very soon. But.....

More than a month ago, i have requested for some T-shirt designs to be submitted to me. I wanted my trainees to take ownership of this project and to come up with various designs to protray our club spirits.

The criteria was simple, the T-shirt must be:

1. Professional Looking (cannot have Ah beng look)
2. Can be Sleeveless or Singlet
3. The front side must be White (STF guideline)
4. Must bear Club Logo.

I will be getting Dri-Fit material for this T-shirt, thus the cost is expected to be slightly higher. Our last cotton-material T-shirt cost $12. So, if anyone out there reading this can forward me a contact of the T-shirt printing company who provide Dri-Fit material, pls contact me via your comments.

Cheers :)

Pesta Sukan 2006

At 12am two nights ago, one of my trainees rang me up while i was watching "A Sad Love Story" (korean VCD serial). He sounded very excited and enthusiatic (at 12am in the morning!) which got me wondering if he had some drunken female companion beside him. Haha, just joking.

Anyway, the purpose of his call was to ask me if there was training on wednesday evening. By the way, we have taekwondo lessons on every Monday, Wednesday & Friday. He also mentioned that he would like to have tougher training on Monday class.

This chap just turned 18 last month. Guess he wanted to achieve something before getting his black belt this year; he requested for me to torture him in training so that he can be champion in the Pesta Sukan 2006. Hee..... i am enjoying the thought now..... :)

Being a very loving coach, i have no choice but to oblige to his request. Hence, from this friday onwards, he shall receive the toughest and most gruesome training he can ever imagine. It will be all bruises, blood & more.

so watch this blog for updates! :)

My First Blog...

Hi there,

this happen to be the first time i am posting. Nothing much to share though; as my thoughts are quite empty. :)

Anyway, this will be a blog to express and share my passion to everyone on the sports i love; Taekwondo.

I started my training in this martial arts in 1992. I was training under an affliliate group to International Taekwondo Federation in Singapore; Singapore Taekwondo Academy (STA). I was awarded 1st degree black belt in 1995 and in the same year, i won my first and only Silver Medal in National Taekwondo Championship (Guinness Cup).

In 1998, i joined Singapore Taekwondo Federation (STF, affiliate to World Taekwondo Federation) in search of personal progression in this martial arts. I started my own Taekwondo school in 2003 together with my partner, Mr David Tan, after completion of our national coaching accredation, NCAP Level 1.

In 2005, i was awarded 2nd degree black belt by the STF, and in the same year i was named the Best Referee in the 32nd National Taekwondo Championship (Pesta Sukan 2005) after completing the National Referee Course Level 1.

Having trained and coached for more than ten years, there is no moment in time i felt more happy then watching my trainees progress, mature and improve. I want to take this opportunity to thank them all for bringing me the many joy and happiness.

Thank you! :)