Today on the show we are covering the pugilistic, the pugnacious, the sweet science, the brawlhalas! Yes that’s right! We’re covering Korea’s fighting sports- the ones you can attend and even participate in, if you’re bold enough! Ring the bell! *Boxing bell sound*.
Korea’s traditional wrestling and competitions.
We’re going to start by talking about Taekwondo. You’re probably thinking it is the oldest martial art in Korea. But you're wrong! Yes, gentle listeners, Taekwondo formed from 8 similar fighting styles in the 1940s and 50s. The precursor to taekwondo is called taekkyun, and that is not that old either. The very first of the martial arts is called Subak, which also means watermelon in Korean. Now you’re wondering, do they shout “watermelon” when breaking a board? I haven’t found evidence. Subak comes from around 2000 years ago and was a kids game, a drinking game and later a martial art. Taekkyun formed later and added in components of Chinese martial arts as well as armed and unarmed combat. You can find Subak today at some demonstrations but the main worldwide organization is controlled by North Korea. There is also another much newer art called Subak-do which is not related to Subak. I’m no expert but I suspect some of the demo videos on YouTube are of the newer style and not the traditional style. There's a bit of confusion about the open and closed hand portion, which you can read about on wikipedia and rack your brain in the process. And then we come to Ssireum. Ssi-reum with two S’s not one S. This started around the same time as Subak and it’s a wrestling style without punches or kicks. It’s not quite like Sumo. Unlike Sumo, Ssireum wrestlers start by grabbing each other’s satba or traditional belt and focus on rotating their opponent off their feet. Yeah on the video it looks like they’re grabbing each other’s crotch but trust me that’s not the case. That’s just the camera angle. Anyway, Ssireum is much easier to find around Korea than taekkyun or Subak. I’ve seen tournaments on broadcast TV during Seollal. Unfortunately, that seems like the only time Ssireum gets attention. For a homework assignment, some students suggested the boy band groups go to western countries and demonstrate Ssireum in front of fans during meetups. I mean…this is a big-boy sport so I don’t know how that’ll work. It’s a good idea, though the HYBE group probably won’t appreciate their stars getting plopped on TV.
Anyway, if you want to learn Taekwondo or hapkido, there are hagwons in every city. Problem is, there aren’t many adults taking classes so you’ll have a lack of sparring partners when you get off work unless you live in the big city or only wish to train on weekends. Or like one of my friends, you like beating them whiny ass kids up. *Joke sting*. Gumdo the Korean sword style attracts more adult students, but their dojos can be harder to find. As far as English lessons go, I have seen ads for a few of them around Facebook and in my town, but they’re not consistent. Your best bet is to ask foreigners in town and one of them might hook you up. Of course, learning a bit of Korean would help with the lessons. We’ll talk about it more next season.
If you’re interested in watching tournaments, well that’s a bit trickier. Pretty much the only time I see taekwondo on TV here is during the Olympics, which shouldn’t make sense. Matches are often held at national & provincial sports festivals. There are also tournaments but you’ll need to check the World Taekwondo website for details. Gwangju hosted a tournament a few years ago and may do so again.
Road FC, Kickboxing and other fighting competitions:
Let’s say you’re a fighting sports fan. You like UFC and the other promos and want to know if they’re here in Korea. First things first, Korea’s fighting competitions market has waned quite a bit since the 2000s. For a while, I hadn’t seen any promos even on the sports channels. But interest has increased since COVID and I think the premier comp Road FC is here to stay. Road FC has matches a few times a year I think. Their most recent big comp was March 16th and you can watch highlights on YouTube. They also show live on SPOTV. About the only way you’ll know there’s a match on is if you check the Road FC website or their instagram, where I learned about their next tournament on June 28th. Link is in the description. As far as the matches themselves go, they seem less, I don’t know, aggressive compared to other promotions like UFC. They’ve got the standard pageantry and ring girls, but there isn’t a fake edginess like the UFC. However the style of fighting is more blow oriented rather than takedown. I still saw takedowns in the clips for Road FC 72 but not that many and the ones I saw didn’t have a joint lock or submission or much pounding. It seemed like they weren’t that good at takedowns. I recommend watching the Lee Sin Woo versus Pyeon Ye Jun match for a good demonstration of this.
Not into ground & pound? There’s kickboxing here as well, though its popularity has declined a lot. MaxFC is the main promotion here and while its website looks bad, it seems reasonably organized. Their ring girls are better looking than Road FCs, if that’s what you’re into. Their most recent promotion was March 15th in Iksan, but when I checked Facebook and their website, it didn’t list an upcoming promotion. So best of luck to you. I’ll leave the link in the description.
Boxing’s decline since 80s olympics:
And now we come to a sport that used to be big but seems to be gone; boxing. Boxing was really popular in the 1960s with streets being emptied so people could flock to TVs to watch matches. Boxer Kim Ki-soo became a national hero when he won the WBA middleweight belt back in 1966. He had quite the interesting life story- he was born in South Hamyeong North Korea then moved to Yeosu during the Korean war and took up boxing. It became big because of how it showed people that people could succeed if they worked hard enough even if all they had was their two hands. Korea produced a couple of other big name winners, and even had a few gold winners in the 88 Olympics that we talked about on that episode. But nowadays, gym owners complain about parents not wanting their kids to get too beat up and the prize purses being low so nobody takes the sport seriously. But speaking of the Olympics, boxer Im Aeji brought home the first bronze medal for women’s boxing last year. Also, boxer Choi Hyun-mi held the WBA women’s super featherweight belt for 10 years. So it’s not like the boxing scene in Korea’s totally dead yet. But you couldn’t tell from the KBC’s website! They haven’t posted any new matches on their schedule since 2023. I’ll include the link but don’t get your hopes up. You’re better off checking the sports pages of MK Daily or Naver before you check the KBC.
Other fighting sports in Korea;
And now we talk about the other fighting sports you might not know about. Tekken used to be big here. I remember seeing players gathered around boxes at the arcade playing it. Not so much these days. Even the new one hasn’t really moved the needle here. The other fighting sport is the ever-popular pro wrestling. The PWS has returned and they have big promotions every month to two months. They even have a minor division in Pyeongtaek. I’ve read about a few foreign teachers who’ve jumped into the ring with PWS these days. If you're interested in pro wrestling that’s between backyard wrestling and early years WWF, this might be what you're looking for. They had a promotion last week and one more coming up in April. Search PWS Korea on YouTube and you’ll find their channel in no time.
A few famous fighters
We’re going to take a few minutes to go over a few famous fighters. You probably heard of Choi Hong Man. He was called Korean Colossus and he’s 7 foot 2. He came to fame in the mid aughts with a victory in the Seoul Grand Prix tournament and even fought Jose Canseco and Bob Sapp in celebrity matches. Yeah, Canseco was completely overmatched and to be honest, got very little sympathy from the media. His skills declined in the past decade and he’s retired now, living in the mountains of Jeju to get away from toxic internet culture. I haven’t heard much from him lately but there was talk of returning to the ring. Anyway if you’re on Jeju and you see a really withdrawn tall guy with blond hair, it might be him. The other fighter of note I found in my research was Song Ga-yeon. She fought in Road FC, but her story is unique because she was once a ring girl. She fought two matches before retiring. I think she was signed to a Singapore competition but it’s not clear whether she fought there or not. Anyway, her joining the MMA scene was quite controversial and some fans wrote that she was over hyped for clout reasons. While not related to her MMA career, she was once threatened to be chainsawed to death by a friend of a contestant she was beefing with on the show. Hell I’d probably take up MMA if fruitloops were threatening me with horror movie deaths, too! Another famous fighter was Jo Hyeongmin Son, aka Random Task from the Austin Powers movie. He’s the guy who throws the shoe. Anyway he’s in a California prison for life for murder and torture. Also there’s Jung Chan-Sung aka the Korean Zombie who fought in the UFC from 2011 to 2023. The zombie nickname comes from when he kept attacking despite heavy blows, and his team in Korea gave him the nickname before he joined the UFC.
Game of the week!
With winter in the rear mirror, we have to wrap up our ice sports coverage with the ISU World Championships 2025 in Boston. Coverage started on the 25th but wraps up this weekend. You can watch it on Naver Sports but you’ll need to wake up at midnight. On Saturday we get KIA vs Hanwha and it’s the home opener of their new stadium! Here’s hoping they actually finished all the construction and moved in the vendors! Or you can go with FC Seoul vs Daegu in an early powerhouse matchup. On Sunday there’s an interesting basketball game between 안양 정관장 and Suwon KT. If Anyang wants a guaranteed playoff berth, they’ve got to win out! Also I won’t be recording next week, so my game of the week for April will be HL Anyang vs Red Eagles Hokkaido at Anyang ice arena on Thursday April 3rd. Will Anyang go for the sweep or will Hokkaido continue the series? You’ll have to tune in and see.
Ending
Thanks for tuning in today! We hoped you learned something new about Korean sports like I certainly did! Please share this podcast with your friends & family, anyone you think would be interested in irreverent takes on Korean Sports. Especially give this to rookies. They need alllll the help they can get. Don’t forget to rate our podcast 5 stars of course. But don’t do it if you don’t like us. You can email the show at hwatingsportspodcast at gmail.com or leave a comment on our various podcast sites. Hate mail will be read aloud on special episodes and ruthlessly mocked. Fan mail will be mocked but in a more wholesome way. Our next episode will be on the 11th of April and we’re covering the basketball playoffs! Music notes like the opening song thanks to DumiAFava. Cover art thanks to our live-in cycling expert James! A shoutout to our listeners in Newtownards Northern Ireland! Home of the 5th best football team in the NIFL! Go get ‘em Ards! Guests of the Hwa-ting sports podcast dine at the hidden Lotteria outside Seongnam! Get a good deal on their chicken thigh burger and the giant sized chicken-katsu while you plot the next military coup with the generals! Coffee is always discounted and served in tall mugs so your coup planning is never interrupted! Until next time, Korean sports fans!
Notes:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Subak?wprov=sfla1
http://m.roadfc.co.kr/mobile/tickets/list.php