Taekwondo is being contested over 4 days at the 2008 Summer Olympics in Beijing, China. Beginning Wednesday July 20 through to Saturday July 23.

Each day, there will be 2 finals being played out. I hope that television coverage will be good this time. Typically, the finals are televised simply because they determine the most important outcome – however, in the sport of Taekwondo it may be more interesting to watch the preliminary matches leading up to the finals.

Perth, Western Australia, is lucky enough to be in the same timezone as Beijing. So we needn't stay up too late and lose …

Read original blog post

The Opening Ceremony for the 2008 Beijing Olympic Games is over now. Televised Live on Australian TV, Channel 7 – in Perth, anyway … not sure about other states.

I was expecting 8:08pm start, and when I switched over at 8:00pm drums were already beating.

Taekwondo was mentioned by the commentary a fair number of times during the opening ceremony. Mainly when the competitors were walking out into the middle. 204 or 205 nations stepped out…making it about 3 hours long!!!

From my recollection, Afghanistan's flag bearer is from Taekwondo and I think one of the final torch bearers, a Chinese woman, was a Taekwondo gold medallist. Some of the smaller countries (as in number of competitors in the Olympics) had entrants for Taekwondo

There's always 2 memorable things I take away from the Olympics/Opening Ceremony

1. The Olympic Song
2. The lighting of the Olympic cauldron

1992 – there was “Amigos Para Siempre” by Sarah Brightman and someone else, and an archer shooting a fire-lit bow into the cauldron

1996 – there was “Power of the Dream” by Celine Dion and Muhammad Ali lighting a torch that was pulleyed up to the cauldron.

2000 – there was a song by Nikki Webster and Kathy Freeman lighting a mechanical monstrocity through water that eventually carried its way to the cauldron.

2004 – for some reason I cannot remember.

2008 – I have no idea what the song is, I'm sure they'll play it several times more over the next two weeks. And that running man suspended up high across the top of the stadium was pretty cool. Probably not noticeable, though I can imagine how difficult it can be to balance like he did being carried by only 2 ropes.

I wasn't really a big fan of Michael Phelps before, because Ian Thorpe was still swimming back then. But look at him now!!! The most successfull Olympian ever!!! ??? !!!

Hmmmm, one sporting discipline – multiple divisions, multiple medal contention. Sounds similar to something in Taekwondo also. Unfortunately, that aspect of the Taekwondo Sport is not included in the Summer Olympics program.

And for those who haven't clicked through to the site given by AussieLee, our Australian Taekwondo team are Ryan Carnelli, Burak Hasan, Carmen Marton and Tina Morgan.

I just saw the men's final from yesterday's competition. Between Mauro Sarmiento (Italy) vs. Hadi Saei (Iran) in the under 80kg division.

It was aired on SBS just before 4:30pm AWST. Lauren Burns was commentating with another guy. I just switched over from channel 7 where they were showing mountain bike riding, and I caught the action with 0-0 in the first round.

Great comeback for the Iranian champion to fight back from a 1-4 defecit in the first round to finish a 6-4 victor.

As expected, with the quality of top fighters. Though I'd rather see a demolition from a one-sided match where one fighter absolutely canes the other person. More likely to happen in preliminary rounds.

Dual Olympic champion Steven Lopez won Bronze in this same category.

Kick in the face has Taekwondo fighting for Olympic Survival!

BEIJING (AFP) – A kick in the face of a taekwondo referee by furious loser Angel Valodia Matos had officials in damage control Sunday as they tried to prop up a sport which is fighting for Olympic survival.

Controversy was the last thing Taekwondo needed in Beijing following angry scenes in Athens four years ago ignited by a storm of protests over refereeing decisions.

Read more here and WTF president's response and mention of the future of Taekwondo.

“Definitely, it will be introduced in the 2012 London Games,” Choue said.
Talking about electronic head and body gear.