The truth and misunderstanding of Gongkwon Yusul tournaments.

When people speak of martial arts, main topic of the discussion is always about how effective and realistic the technique is. There are many ways to train, in order to use the techniques properly. One of the best way to understand how the techniques work in real life situations are the tournaments.

Gongkwon Yusul is carrying on the much needed cultures of the Asian martial art's philosophies and tradition, while also using modern day training method. In Gongkwon Yusul, the modern day training methods are done by using gloves, sandbags, coaching mitts, shields, arm mitts, chest gears, etc. In addition, the take down and the grappling techniques are taught in a scientific methods. Fitting the 21st century well, the takedowns and the grappling techniques are also a big part of Gongkwon yusul tournaments.

Gongkwon yusul consists of teachings from both modern day and past. Because of this, sometimes even the people who have an interest in Gongkwon yusul misunderstand Gongkwon Yusul. Within these people, especially those who trained in MMA often misunderstand the rules of Gongkwon Yusul tournaments.


1. In Gongkwon Yusul, attacks to the face area is not permitted.

In Gongkwon Yusul, we put on gloves to practice punches to the face and more, but in tournaments it is not permitted to throw any blows to the face. The tournaments do not permit face contact in order to carry on the tradition of the Asian martial arts and to prevent injuries to your opponent.

Typically, the Asian martial arts do not permit face contact even during practice. The face contacts using fists were rarely done especially in the traditional martial arts such as Tae Kwon Do, Karate and Kung Fu. I believe the reason for this is to respect others. Although Gongkwon Yusul is a modern day martial arts, we try our best to not to forget the fulfillments that is gained by valuing and carrying on the traditions of the true traditional martial arts more than the 21st century's fighting sports.

We do not use gloves in Gongkwon Yusul tournaments. If you use your trained fists to attack your opponent’s face, a chances of most likely hood for breaking your opponent’s nose or jaw would be very high. As a non professional martial artists, you should not focus on how to hurt your opponent. Instead, you should focus on checking your skills.

Some people think we borrowed rules from the new MMA style Karate, because of the no face contact rule.

We have never trained in the New MMA style Karate or know of it’s basic movements. When a black belt holder from a new MMa style Karate trains in Gongkwon Yusul, They say striking is totally different from the way they have trained before. A beginner boxer who uses gloves or a beginner MMA fighter who uses open finger gloves, won’t understand how to use bare fists. To these beginners, Gongkwon yusul can look similar to the new MMA style Karate. If the Tae Kwon Do allowed low kicks and punches just like the new MMA style Karate does, the tournaments from both style can look similar to each other.

The Gongkwon Yusul is being developed by training in strikings, takedowns and grappling while using the Gongkwon yusul tournaments’ rules.


2. Wrestling style takedowns are not allowed.

Wrestling's tackle also includes taking down your opponent on to a top of the matt into grappling, which are great techniques. Although, focusing of the grappling more has sealed away the fantastic techniques of leg used throws. This downfall is being created by most of the people only focusing on how to train the easiest or the safest ways to train their takedown techniques.

This is the reason of leg used techniques are being absent in UFC like MMA tournaments all around the world.

Wrestling’s tackle technique is one of a very effective way to take down your opponent. Gongkwon yusul teaches how to do a tackling technique as a beginner's curriculum. Even though, in Gongkwon Yusul tournaments, it is not allowed.

Although winning is important, the Asian martial arts emphasizes more on how to lose. In Korean chess, sometimes players forfeit the match when the game is only ⅓ finished to prevent an ugly lost. I believe this is from the martial art’s way of emphasizing the importance of the match not the winning or losing.

In Judo, when you use only the defensive techniques to protect your points, you will be given a warning and continue to do so can result in a losing the match. The Judo expects clean and fair match by having this rule. The most of the people believe Judo has this rule only to have a great match, it is also because of exceeding minds of the martial artists’.

Tackling has been approved as an effective technique to bring down your opponents in many ways, but in Gongkwon Yusul tournaments, it is not allowed. this is not because of thinking of a tackling technique as a bad technique, it is because of the mind setting as the martial artist.


3. Time restriction on grappling.

Normally, a disagreement of the time restriction on grappling comes from a person who has never trained once in their life.

Gongkwon yusul matches do not have rounds. Official matches of Gongkwon Yusul are three minutes. Also, we use point system. The point system is different from round system where they gather the points at the end of the each rounds. The point system determines the winner by one swift technique. The point systems are also used by Korean wrestling, Gumdo and Judo as well. Judo also has a time restriction on grappling.

Brazilian Jujitsu awards points to a person who is in a better position during the match, but in Gongkwon yusul does not. Instead of fighting for a better position, Gongkwon Yusul teaches how to apply the techniques now that you are on the ground. The importance of being able to continue and effectively applying the next techniques are emphasized. In addition, Gongkwon Yusul teaches various ways of strikings to lead to the takedowns and finally into a grappling in a short time.


4. Purpose of light contacts.

In the beginning stage of Gongkwon Yusul, there were no protective gears. Using all your might, taking down your opponents were the rules. These rules were nothing about being realistic rules, it was simply about taking down your opponents.
In the beginning of Gongkwon Yusul, people believed that training in a real MMA tournaments ways were the ways to understand and obtain effective techniques. Tournaments were just like MMA. Doing so it created a lot of injured people. In tournaments, with every win, you had to face someone stronger each time. A broken nose, an over extending of the knee, dislocation of shoulders or ankle were common. Sometimes about half of the competitors had to be admitted into the hospital. After going through a such things, no one wanted to participate in the Gongkwon Yusul tournaments again.

Also, the students who only focused on these harsh techniques started to forget the importance of respecting the others. On top of it all, only those who are especially talented participated in tournaments. This has pushed away Gongkwon Yusul from being a enjoyable martial arts.

Not even 3% of MMA practitioners all over the world participates in a MMA tournaments because of the injuries that MMA tournaments can cause. Just as Gongkwon Yusul did in the beginning stage, only the people who are talented participated in the tournaments which only makes less than 3% of MMA practitioners all over the world.

Starting 2010, Gongkwon Yusul has changed it’s rule of the tournaments to light contact only. After the rule change, the 80% of Gongkwon Yusul practitioners participated in the tournaments. Dangers of being injured has gone down significantly and the establishment of a rule which allows to use your skills fully has increased tournaments’ participants. Gongkwon Yusul has made a realistic martial arts into a popular martial arts to train in.


What does present moment leaves for the past?
Answer to this question is not easy to find. Rarely we get a chance to experience martial arts of the future. The Gongkwon Yusul’s significant improvements made from 1996, when Gongkwon Yusul has first set a foot into this world to now, are very similar to the significant improvements of technology from 1990’s to now.“ Gongkwon Yusul is a martial art of the future that we can experience at the present moment.”