Kendo tournament question

[J_24]

Excuse me but when a Japanese vs a Korean in a Kendo tournament are they both kendo players? or one kendo and one kumdo ?

[Neil Gendzwill]

Kendo and kumdo are the same thing. They fight under the same rules. Kumdo is the korean pronunciation of the same chinese characters that read kendo in Japanese.

[ScottUK]

I thought I read somewhere that Kendo & Kumdo had different rules?

[Eldritch Knight]

The difference in rules is primarily aesthetic (different color flags, traditional bows, etc). Unless you get down into the really nitty gritty aspects of the art and pay attention to how each practitioner moves and what tactics they employ, kendo and kumdo are essentially the same. Many people make a big fuss about the difference (myself included), but there are plenty who just don't care. In the end, though, the Japanese and Korean kendo federations have come up with a set of rules that both agree upon, and as far as I've seen, is identical between the two (excluding above aesthetic differences).