Posts by Master James

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Karate Kids

By
Master James
– October 27, 2011

Teaching Kids Martial Arts is never an easy task, the attention span just isn’t there, you need an endless supply of drills and games to disguise repetition and you need to educate them in an exciting manner.

I used to love teaching these sessions, but as our numbers dropped some years ago my enthusiasm drained, this was our fault, we stopped advertising, stopped pushing for more students and in doing so became unorganised. Now things couldn’t be more different. Starting small we have a regular class of youngsters who have just gained their first Tags in our Karate Kids program, the tag was for pad drills and throughout the class I was surprised at how eager they were to impress the Black Belts and how each one had taken the drills home with them to practice.

It was a different kind of enthusiasm than you see in normal Adult classes, and for those that don’t want to teach children, or in fact don’t like teaching them, I would beg you to reconsider. I felt a great amount of pride swelling when we dismissed them and the father of one of the sons approached me to say that he thought it was great what we were doing, he wanted to thank me personally.

You often don’t get thanked in your role as Instructor, this sometimes leaves you feeling a little taken for granted, but its part of the job, however its times like this that makes the headaches, late nights, hours ploughed into coaching etc.. all worthwhile.

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EMTF British Championships 2011 Review.

By
Master James
– June 21, 2011

A long 8 hour journey awaited the Cornwall contingent ( a little longer for those in my car that got left behind and lost ) and an early rise on the Saturday in order to make it across to the new hall in time. Well, tbh we left it a little late and arrived later than planned although it didn’t seem to matter too much as the Championships started a little late, eventually running from 9am to somewhere past 7pm. A very tiring few days indeed.

How did it go? This was easily one of the hardest EMTF British Comps we have ever entered, nerves were running high throughout the camp and I think now there’s a huge amount of expectation from ISK Martial Arts to perform well, our last few outings on the circuit have proved that we don’t do things by halves, we are a consistent and well trained team capable of winning any category. I don’t think we disappointed anyone, bringing home a massive haul of silverware and one very pleased Grand Champion ( although I think we were unlucky to not have 2! )

The Day started with speeches from KJN Salm ( unexpected to see him there although I had my suspicions ) and SBN Kumar, before heading immediately into Gup Hyungs, something that I have never seen happen, usually the Masters perform first, then Dans and then Gups, so this was a little different already. All the Gups performed excellently, followed by our Dan members. Setting us off to a great start.

Next was my turn. Unfortunately I was suffering ( and still am as I write this ) from illness of which the severity hasn’t yet been established, needless to say though that because of this I was neither in the correct frame of mind to perform well or in good physical condition. This saddened me as I usually like my Hyungs, its quite depressing knowing you’r not going to be able to perform at your best, but I hate to pull out of these events ( even though I threatened to all day ) and decided to give it a go. I thought I did ok with the Wang Shu Hyung but in a huge category I didn’t place, but my Chil Sung could have been much better, placing 4th in another big category was good considering my physical condition but I made a silly mistake which probably cost me a trophy. Never mind. At this point I really did feel like giving up for the day, settling more into my coaching role and not wanting to step onto the mat. My stomach was in a lot of pain for most of the day and was now giving me a very bad back ache as well as my kidneys. I was signed up for sparring but I also knew who I would be fighting, anyone who knows my opponent knows that he is tough to beat and hits hard, one hit in the wrong place could seriously injury me and so I had to think about it all day, eventually only deciding at the last moment to go and grab my pads despite a nagging voice stating over and over in my head that I should not compete.

Before my match the rest of the team took to the mats once again to prove they can fight as well as they can perform beautiful Hyungs. And everywhere I looked I saw trophies being presented to Team ISK Members ( Nicknamed the Viper Squad ) Throughout the day I was tired, sore and drained, with my own losses in Hyungs and general illness I have to say I got quite emotional at times with the ease of which my students were competing, very much in their element – even those attending their first Championships, testament to the methods we are using to acclimatise them to such conditions in advance.

The day kept me busy as I rushed around to support as many as I could, and picking up those that fell. Most memorable was a Junior student crying after losing the Hyungs, after a big hug and a sit down she was ok and fired up for sparring, which she went on to win! British Champion after all.
My Sparring category was eventually called and as usual all rings were closed and the crowd gathered around us. Weirdly I get nervous all the way up to the point at which the rings are closed, it feels like your friends are there to support you more when they are forced to be that close. It reassures me.

My First opponent made me very nervous at first so I tried not to let it show, launching in with blitzes after careful stalking right from the start, my distancing seemed to be pretty accurate and I was pleased, gaining a pretty good win and again having another emotional hit that day, after sitting down to grab some water I became aware of what I had accomplished, I had won the battle that I had been worried about all week and suddenly no other fight mattered. I didn’t care.

The second fight was very very technical, fighting a World Champion from Wales, and it was very close, I lost but came away smiling, I was tired, but put up a good fight and had fun, and that should be what everyone seeks to take away from these events. I was immensely proud when his hand was raised but the chief ref Master Trudgill said that that was an amazing fight and that he won on this day, meaning that it could go either way. ( cue third big emotional hit )

Suprisingly I had to fight again for 3rd place and there was no way any silly mistake would rob me, so I played safe making it a boring fight, tbh I don’t care, the opponent was a friend and awkward to fight so I took points where I could but never went aggressively. 2 minutes later and a hand raised followed by a friendly hug meant I had won 3rd Place in the Masters Sparring, and it was probably one of my favourite placings ever. I did it against the odds, in front of my friends, in front of my supportive girlfriend and came out absolutely beaming. I’ve not often felt prouder of my performance.

I’d like to say a big well done to all those that attended, the competition was hard and we did exceptionally well. Those that did place and those that didn’t. I hope everyone took something away with them.

 

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Um and Yang

By
Master James
– May 17, 2011

(an old post from last year)

The title above relates to my mood right now, a mixture of Good and Bad, Positive and Negative.

With my grading looming ( just 2 weeks away now ) im really beginning to feel the strain, my social life is non existent, ive made sacrifices in my personal life ( for better or worse ), im losing sleep, training in some form or another pretty much every day, financially strained and emotionally drained, but i know this is all part of the test, why put such high esteem in a grade that is/was easy?

So my positives at the moment are mainly the fact that im learning again, im finding my weaknesses in training, and rediscovering the joys and pressures of gradings as i almost forgot. I now know how my students feel as they approach their Dan grade, i am also now very eager to send my students off to the panel to grade for their Masters one day. Perhaps then they will realise how i now feel, and how im in need of their support and help. Most of my training at the moment seems to be solo training, its hard to find people that can give up an evening/weekend day to help me in such things as pad holding, swimming, gym work or partnering me for sparring/ho sin sool/il soo sik, at times ive felt quite down about it as i speed home after work to jump into the dojang, get changed on my own and head into my solo program usually consisting of running through all the forms i currently know. Today i had a mixed day and this is what mainly brought me to write this post.

After initially aiming to head over to the guys in Penryn and not having anyone to travel with i decided it was back to the lonely Dojang again to get a sweat on, already in a not so sweet mood i decided to have a quick clean up again as i started this a few weeks ago when it really got me the state that its sometimes left in. After about 15-20 minutes i had it looking pretty good, im actually quite pleased. And heres where the positive started to sink in at last, i stood back and realised that i have turned the Academy around to something im even more proud of, its not clean as such and not finished but its looking much better, im much happier. The satisfaction was great and i headed into the session much happier, pleased that i had achieved something without relying on anyone else. Next i had a good round of forms, finishing off with some Staff work, digging out my acrylic staff with lights and trained in the dark just to make it a bit different.

After the session i sat down and contemplated for a bit. This is my grading, my test and if i pass it will be my victory and my achievement. It would have been nice to have support all the way through it, but in not always having it i can take sole credit for my own efforts, i dragged myself to the gym when poorly and injured, travelled to train when exhausted and wanted rest and given up alot to try to make the grade. I really wonder who else has done that for their grading ( either past, present or future ) I have seen little evidence of it from most, and as such I challenge any reader to ask themselves truthfully if this applies to them, and how would they feel if they failed that grading with the reason being that they could have tried a little harder? It could happen to me and it could of happened to you… I sincerely believe now that in order to progress in anything that needs such dedication as Tang Soo Do does then sacrifices need to made.

I have learned lots of lessons during the training for this grade, some positive and some negative but all relative and will be covered in more detail at a later date.

I will stress that this isnt aimed at anyone and is just how i feel today, hence the purpose of my blog, however  i also always say if you think it could apply to you then think about it im very happy with the people i teach and train with, i possibly think im overdoing things at the moment and its leaving me drained and negative at times, which was brought to my attention by one of my Dan grades this week at training which was the catalyst for me finally updating my blog.

I leave you with this quote. Quote apt i feel

Striving for success without hard work is like trying to harvest where you haven’t planted