Grand Master – Centre Stage!
Wednesday, 25 November 2009
On Saturday 21 and Sunday 22 November Grand Master Sung Soo Lee visited the Factor10™ Martial Arts Strathpine State Training Centre providing a second to none opportunity for members to get up close and personal with this world renowned Korean Grand Master.
Grand Master Lee challenged Factor10™ members on the Saturday program to step up and perform the traditional World Taekwondo Federation patterns or Poomse embracing the latest pattern corrections.
Technical aspects including the development of dynamic power and extraordinary balance through the traditional stances were just some of the key focus points of Grand Master Lees seminar in traditional Poomse.
“Grand Master Lee is just extraordinary”, said one of the parents watching the traditional Korean Master, “This man is 73 years of age and is an absolute dynamo! His movements are perfect … his balance, power … and he just keeps going through the heat of the middle of the day and just not tiring. How does he do it? He is an absolute inspiration for people of every age, not just my kids.”
Later on Saturday afternoon parents and friends seized the almost once in a lifetime opportunity to have their family photo taken with Grand Master Lee.
The Sunday program focussed on the traditional Hapkido Martial Art of “Power Coordination” and in particular ground grappling and self defence. As Grand Master Lee explained to the group, “Self defence situations often finish up on the ground, leaving us to draw on our ground grappling and defence principles and training. Just being able to stand up and kick and punch is not enough these days.”
The Hapkido students were totally focussed on Grand Master Lee’s ability to show each of the 17 ground grappling moves with perfect and precise timing and distance. Mr O’Flaherty worked with Master Lee during the seminar to assist students in picking up the finer details of these traditional ground based defence moves.
The movements included a variety of techniques such as joint locking and twisting to submission, leg and arm locks, pressure point applications and explosive striking moves utilising elbows and knees.
Grand Master Lee is the only Grand Master in the world to have achieved a World Taekwondo Federation 9th Dan, Korea Hapkido Federation 9th Dan, 2nd Dan in Judo and 1st Dan Karate.
Grand Master Lee officially announced his endorsement for Mr O’Flaherty to assume the title of “Kwang Jang” or International Master. Master O’Flaherty will be sitting his 6th Dan Taekwondo and 5th Dan Hapkido gradings in March 2010 and Grand Master Lee will be visiting to preside over the examination.
Another moment of excellence for Factor10™ members and families.
