Representing a truly fine attempt at breaking TKD down as a science
to be reformulated and analyzed in stages, this book offers great insight
to any serious Tae Kwon Do athlete. While it focuses on elite level athletes,
any serious recreational TKD athlete can benefit greatly from this book.
Some of the concepts may not be groundbreaking to personal trainers or
fitness professionals/experts, but often such information is not presented
in the same terms to student of TKD. It is written in an academic manner
but is still easy to understand, although a strong fitness background
would certainly assist the reader.
The book is one of the few works that attempt to illustrate the comprehensive
and strategic approach to peak performance sport training in TKD. This
includes a year round, long term strategy for the off season, general
and more sport specific preseason training, and in-season training or
maintenance. It touches upon periodization, and both macro and micro-cycles
throughout all areas. It discusses the concepts/approaches needed within
each one of these timeframes to develop the various attributes needed
for TKD competition: both aerobic and anaerobic conditioning, muscle strength
and muscle endurance, flexibility, and how these relate to taper off periods.
There is also a section on psychological elements and a chapter on injury.
While the chapters are divided into the various attributes and dealt with
singularly (which is admittedly an organizational necessity) it still
leaves some questions as to how these elements relate in the overall picture….the
total, comprehensive program at times remains a little vague. Interspersed
throughout these chapters are a wealth of facts and figures, tidbits from
the Oregon TKD Research Project, and other studies which offer glimpses
otherwise unavailable outside the world circuit into elite level performance.
This book is truly a unique source of information.
Given the scientific, clinical nature of the book, some of the critique
must focus on such elements. The authors themselves make three caveats
in the introduction. First, scientifically significant differences may
not really matter in practicality. In other words, the difference between
.15 seconds and .17 s might be scientifically significant, but does .02
s really matter in terms of blocking a kick? Second, results under lab
conditions may not carry over into the real world. Third, these findings
may not apply to more general populations. There is truth in all of these
statements, and it does remind one that the focus of the book is on elite
level performance, but nevertheless this book still represents (with few
exceptions) some of the best information currently available.
One annoyance is that the book sometimes does not distinguish between
TKD studies and more general studies of other sports, making some statements
seem absolute when they may not be proven in a TKD specific setting. One
could always find issue with certain specific statements within in the
book: it calls over-training, burnout and staleness the same thing, whereas
some sport psychologists would draw distinction between them. Some exercises
in the strength training section could be considered out of favor. Aerobic
guidelines are not ACSM guidelines and the book doesn't draw distinction,
making one wonder whether ACSM was taken into account or not, and if so,
why the distinction? Other statements seem based on one study and fly
in the face of consensus; elaboration would again be helpful in such circumstances.
Given the amount of detail and nature of the book, however, such contentions
are relatively few. Perhaps the weakest section is the psychological training
section. What is discussed is relatively well done, although there is
limited detail for application, and it fails to discuss other elements
such as Individual Zones of Optimal Functioning that are staples of the
subject, particularly in individual sports.
From more of a content rather than technical perspective, the book is
meticulous and advanced in some areas only to be rather remedial in others.
Given the level of readers sophistication the book normally assumes, the
strength training exercises are rather obvious. At times, the book simply
states consult a specialist or another source and moves on, remaining
focused on TKD, not the background; other times it gets bogged down. The
anatomy of joints chapters is extraneous and remedial. It also talks about
self-defense techniques such as shoulder locks causing injury, which comes
from left field and has no real relevance to sport competition. The injury
chapter has some unique TKD concussion statistics that are interesting,
but as a whole is also rather generic. Even the tactics section is not
very detailed and sporadic in its number and types of examples. Most competent
coaches already should have an understanding of a lot of things listed,
but for one still learning the game this might have more value. Indeed,
the drilling/tactics section could have been expanded and included more
attribute specific and sport specific drills such as for speed, reaction
time, etc. The spirit of the book (in my humble interpretation) could
have been better served by eliminating the anatomy and injury sections
and including a sport specific plyometrics section (of which there is
no mention), and/or discussions on ring strategies and ring management.
Those are true elements of coaching, but perhaps they are less scientific
than the physical elements.
Another of the few drawbacks is that the book is much more based on
theory or concepts than actually creating step-by-step programs, which
could be a disappointment to some readers hoping for just that. As the
book points out, there needs to be a personalization to training principles
in order to reach peak performance, so a cookie cutter approach is not
warranted. Nevertheless, including more case studies, examples of athletes
manipulating variables and asking the right questions, and sample programs
would have greatly reinforced some of the points. It is easy to apply
most concepts to one's individual program, regardless of the level of
competition/skill-if the individual is motivated to do so.
Focusing on the elite players, the book probably is beyond the scope
of the majority of recreationalists, but just about everyone should be
able to take something away from it. Perhaps the book should stress how
these concepts can improve the relative, personal improvement in performance
for anyone willing to make the effort. And if you are the type of person
who wants to put all the necessary time and energy into the sport of Tae
Kwon Do, it is highly recommended that you consider the points in this
book.
|
