The first Singapore Virtual Taekwondo Boot Camp welcomed 30 aspiring athletes on 27 and 28 Jan 2024 and kick-started 2024 in an innovative fashion. These athletes of both genders, aged from 13 to 23 years old, donned on VR headset and motion tracking nodes and used their bodies as game controller to compete against the avatar of their opponent for a fast pace 90 secs challenge each round of Virtual Taekwondo.

The experience at the VT Boot Camp have proven to be immersive and stimulating whereby athletes stayed on beyond the session and challenged themselves further. Many thanks to STF Virtual Taekwondo Committee led by Mr Johnny Lim and Mr Tan Cheng Hui, the active
involvement of technical officials/technical assistants and volunteers in staging this inaugural boot camp and co-created these new learning experiences together with the coaches and participating athletes.

“The boot camp experience has emphasised the inherent disparities between esports taekwondo and its physical counterpart. In the esports domain, achievement relies on endurance and precise execution of rapid kicks, whereas physical taekwondo involves unique
factors. Additionally, for the seamless operation of Virtual Taekwondo (VTKD), the participation of players, volunteers, dependable tech support, and a stable network connection is indispensable.” (Mr Johnny Lim, Chair of Virtual Taekwondo).

Virtual Taekwondo is fun and inclusive and it is non-contact sparring unlike kyorugi taekwondo. Thus, virtual taekwondo enables people of different ages, weight class and gender to compete against one another without barrier. This new version of taekwondo is developed by Refract Technologies with strong support of World Taekwondo.

The STF is staging the inaugural Singapore Open Virtual Taekwondo in the last weekend of April 2024 to promote and develop virtual taekwondo. Details will be shared soon. Enquiries @ stfvtc@gmail.com.

The Singapore Taekwondo Federation (STF) Board, Selections Committee and High Performance Committee would like to thank the participating affiliates, athletes and coaches for being part of the Open Selection 2024.

The Primary Component (Poomsae & Kyorugi), Technical and Physical Components assessment were conducted for the Open Selection in December 2023.

The Open Selection 2024 results are in Annexes 1 and 2.

In accordance with the STF National Development Squad (NDS) 2024 Selection Policy, paragraph on Appeal stated “Candidates shall submit an appeal for review on a case-by-case basis within TWO (2) days of the official announcement of the selection results. The appeal is to be emailed to stkdf@mail.com. The appellant shall be required to pay a bond fee of SGD 200.00 (subjected to GST), which will be forfeited if the appeal is found to be unmeritorious or frivolous. Otherwise, the bond will be refunded to the appellant.” Athletes may refer to the contents on Appeal in the STF NDS 2024 Selection Policy posted on STF website on 29 November 2023 (https://www.stf.sg/reference-documents/national-development-squad-2024-selection-policy/). For avoidance of doubt, the appeal shall be submitted to stkdf@mail.com latest by Friday, 1 March 2024, if the candidate/club wishes to appeal.

All selected athletes are to attend a NDS induction. The details are as follows:

The Letter of Invite including the Athlete Agreement and Code of Conduct of Athlete will be emailed to the selected athletes via their affiliates.

On a sunny day, a group of children, supported by parents, volunteers and a physiotherapist, met in the park a stone’s throw away from Singapore National Stadium. It was 5 November 2023, and the children were part of the PlayBuddy programme for children with special needs.

Dr Teoh Chin Sin founded PlayBuddy in 2016 as a free volunteer-based programme where children meet and play sport weekly. They learn a sport for about four to eight weeks before moving on to another sport.

This time, the children were learning Taekwondo and there was even a special treat awaiting them at the conclusion of this programme.

After learning the basics of kicking, punching, blocking and even breaking a couple of boards over the first three weeks of the programme, the children were invited to Singapore Taekwondo Federation National Training Centre at Lorong Limau to get a taste of what it really meant to train for competitions.

There, the highlight was writing the challenges they faced as children with disabilities on the boards and they have broken the boards to symbolise as overcoming the challenges.

The programme wrapped up after a successful run on the 26 November 2023.

The STF Para-Taekwondo Sub-committee would like to thank the children, parents, volunteers and physiotherapist for their participation. Special thanks are also extended to Dr Teoh for enabling STF and the STF Para-Taekwondo Sub-committee to be a part of this purposeful and meaningful PlayBuddy programme.

The Kyorugi Referee Course will be held on 09 March, 16 March, 17 March & 24 March 2024 at the STF National Training Centre. Black belt holders who wish to officiate in all STF-sanctioned Kyorugi tournaments should take this opportunity to gain the qualification by attending this course.