I'm currently a green belt in WTF TKD. Been practicing it for almost a year and a half along with my 12 year old son, who's been practicing it for almost two years. Both of us are scheduled to test for our blue belts at the end of this month.

what forms do you do, I did Taeguek. But i dislike forms.

That's what i'm doing at the current level.

3rd gup purple belt chayon-ryu tkd

I havent gone to a class in about 3 years, school and then work got in the way but I still practice kicks and stretches daily, forms I had to do the
taeguk pal gae and chang han

I havent practiced forms in the 3 years I've been out of a school, and I am decidedly neutral on them........ great way to practice movements and help get them down right esp the ones you wouldnt normally do. But I kinda agree with bruce lee practicing a list of pre-determined moves how much actual application is there? I would hate to be in the situation where I need to defend myself and have all my combos pre-determined by forms ive drilled in my head, makes me too predictable.
like the Road dog I've been thinking about re-joining a school but I moved cities to a smaller one and finding a good school concerns me.

I am a brown belt in Olympic TKD along with my 8 year old who is a Red Belt (and my 4 year old is a yellow in Hapkido). I'll be testing for Black in a few months. I am working on getting better conditioned right now, mainly b/c I am scared of the 5 hour test! I am learning the Taeguk forms. My instructor is a 4th degree Hapkido master and we are learning Hapkido for our self defense, which is VERY cool. After I have my TKD black, I'll begin training in Hapkido. I love it, and I find it empowering for women!

Black stripe in WTF TKD. Forms are my least favorite thing to do..i would rather be sparring.

I have a Green belt / Blue strip in TKD - but I left TKD to work nights and go back to college. The school no longer has a satalite class in town so I am moving to Krav Maga.

green belt in ITF Taekwondo appart TKD I'm training Krav Maga

2nd Dan black belt in ITF Taekwon-do. Training 12 years and am an Instructor. 3rd Dan is long overdue.... maybe this year.

ive done both ITF and WTF tkd. i got 5th gup in WTF and first dan in ITF.

, a lot of tkd clubs do not allow cross training. they beleive that tkD is the only way and that is all you should do. one of the reasons i stopped going.

5th dan in wtf. A lot of people seem to find patterns boring, but I think they're vital. It irons out a lot of issues with stances and posture that you can get away with otherwise and feed into bad technique. I enjoy them these days, they put me in a good state of mind and are one of the few things I can fully focus on. The internet has turned my brain into a grasshopper in most other activities ;D

ive done both ITF and WTF tkd. i got 5th gup in WTF and first dan in ITF.

, a lot of tkd clubs do not allow cross training. they beleive that tkD is the only way and that is all you should do. one of the reasons i stopped going.

That's too bad. At the gym I train at, we are encouraged to take on other forms of training to better ourselves. Before I had my son (read: I had more time to train) I also trained in boxing and was learning a little bit of grappling.

I'd avoid like the plague any club that claims their martial art is the only one worth doing. All the martial arts are different and you can learn something from all styles, but you'll learn less from a club with that narrow a view.

The WTF is better / worse than ITF argument is stupid. They're different, WTF obviously has a more amusing name, but other than that it's really down to the club and instructor, more than what they call their style. You get inspirational teachers with good clubs and terrible teachers with terrible clubs in every style of every martial art.

Another common stupidity is 'oh but $martial art is just a sport, mine is the real deal'. No it isn't. You don't have to fight for survival, people don't regularly try to kill you, you go to a class with friends and practice. Even if you practice really hard it's still a sport. If you get proficient in any martial art you can use it effectively in a real fight situation, but it's still a (useful, awesome) sport.

Taekwondo here. I did Judo for about two semesters (~8 months), but found it boring. I've done Taekwondo for 10 years now. First degree black belt because I'm a poor doctorate student that doesn't have close to a grand to test any higher lol. I teach at and manage the university taekwondo club, and though it's a huge time commitment, I'm not paid, and I don't receive much support from the club to which we are an affiliate, I still enjoy doing it very much.

Oh and amen to this!: "I'd avoid like the plague any club that claims their martial art is the only one worth doing. All the martial arts are different and you can learn something from all styles, but you'll learn less from a club with that narrow a view."

Judo Ikkyu (3 stripe brown), hopefully do a Batsugun tournament this year and do well enough to earn my black belt. My sensei moved away and I live in a small college town, so no instruction At least BJJ is ubiquitous now and I can improve my matwork and compete in that.

Sucks you can't find a Judo place either man. I will be in love with Judo my whole life, so incredibly beautiful and brutal at the same time. Even after I snapped my ACL in Randori all I cared about was how long before I could come back.

It seems like BJJ is everywhere man, isn't there a good place near you?