“gold luck is heavier than silver”

I think I’m going to have to stop making excuses for missing writing the blog. Basically I need more time in my life. Trying to write it sneakily at work is currently not working very well for me. Well what have I been upto since last week at Garys.. truth be told, not a lot . The dreaded man flu well and truly took hold last Friday, despite being on the cards for 3 days before I though I might be able to shake it off. My failure to orange juice, vitamin and lemsip the hell out of it before it really took hold has meant I have felt complete crap all week, with no motivation for training.

2 weeks of trying to work on the club during lunch times rather than going to the gym combined with the dreaded man disease has basically left me feeling very unfit and loosing my body tone.. As sensei Craig would say the last 7 days I have been about a ‘6 coat’.

One saving grace was the ITF Tae Kwon Do regional competition Held last Sunday at the Moore ways Centre in Derby. Having only passed my black belt in November I headed to the competition with mixed feelings. Having won my sparring category comfortably last year I was confident I could hold my own, yet apprehensive about how differently the BB category might operate.

After what seems like a very long wait finally my category was called. Having been there near on 6hours already and the pills and relaxing bath from the morning wearing off I began to feel slow, tired and heavy. Truth be told by now I was not looking forward to it and just wanted to get it over with. Totally the wrong attitude to step on the mat with.

Won the 1st one, the guy had no idea what I was doing… fighting points confuses the tkd guys the second the ref shouted ‘fight’ I threw the best reverse punch I could muster and the look on his face was price less.. Tough fight though, being a less experienced opponent he just wanted to brawl and the end result was both of us expending far too much energy.

After that and thanks to some brill coaching from a very knowledgeable guy, who I’d only met that day,I managed to fight in a tactical fashion and made short work of the second opponent

Then into the final with for 2 1.5 minute rounds… god it was hard work. I got a full on roundhouse in the ribs and 100’s of sidekicks in the arm. One thing about adopting a more point based style in a tkd competition is that you inevitably get kicked, a lot. You have to trust the judges to make the right decision and realise that despite taking a battering you are in fact not being scored upon. My opponent’s size and weight advantage certainly helped give the barrage of yop chagi’s extra clout.

After the 1st round I was struggling to lift my arm, being knackered I had nothing left in the tank to see past the pain. The end result was that I narrowly missed out on first place. At the time I was elated, having worked so hard and taking away a 2nd place in a pretty tough category. With the benefit of hindsight I can see that had I have not felt quiet so awful and stiff I could have taken it.

Pat was proud though and said I had done exceptionally well. Although, as my new found coach on the day said “gold luck is heavier than silver”.