Olympic Taekwondo Back Kick

Jonathan Reff: Hi! Jonathan here at Somafit; again we are going over Olympic Taekwondo. This technique coming up is the Back Kick. I am setting up this kick again in my fighting stance which has weight distributed a little more on my front leg. I am on the balls of my feet. Now, this technique is a little bit different in that -- it's more of a defensive technique. So, what I am doing here is I am waiting in my fighting stance for my opponent and my target to come forward. So, essentially this is more of a defensive track. So, what I am doing, my opponent steps forward and initiates the confrontation. I am going to turn here, will be my first step and that again involves rotation on the balls of both feet.

Now, as I turned, I have given my opponent my back, but I am looking over my shoulder. I am then going to raise my back leg which in this instance is my right leg; the knee comes up just like the first few kicks. It's tight to the body, which again is the characteristic of Olympic Taekwondo. As that knee stays up and comes up, I am going to then thrust my foot with my heel, leading straight back to hit the target and push and kick my opponent away from me. From this point, I am going to then rotate a 180 back to where I have started from. Now, this has again two variations that I am going to show, which are both jump kicks. Now, the first one is just a very simply a jump back kick and it set up the exact same manner except that as my opponent comes forward, he is already initiated the confrontation of the movement. I am going to turn; but as I turn and rotate, I am going to lift both feet and jump in the air. As I jump I am thinking about jumping up, but also in towards my opponent. So, without the kick the jump will look like that; but again you have to imagine that will be proceeded by a full extended leg. That's the Jump and Back Kick. I am going to show you now a Double Jumping Back Kick, which involves a Cut Kick immediately proceeded by a Back Kick in the air without your feet touching the ground. So, as I have my opponent here with my target, I am again thinking of him as a ladder and so I am using my feet to climb up the rings of the ladder to get to the target area that I want. So, meaning my first kick is going to plan low, after my second I can plan it at any given height or interval. I am going to go ahead and pendulum my legs forward. As I pendulum on forward, my left knee in this case my front leg is coming up; my leg is going to touch the pad. As I make contact with the pad, I am going to then push off his leg using him like a ladder and kick with the Back Kick to really hit with force and power.

As you can see, my first kick hits and the second kick follows with a harder power level and at a different height. Those are the variations of the Back Kick. Next kick will be Spinning Hook Kick.