On Saturday, November 15th, I competed in the Family Karate Center’s Inter-Club Tournament. This time I was competing as a yellow belt with a little bit more experience under my belt . . . (ha ha, get it). Anyway, I practiced all week perfecting my Heian Shodan kata for not only the competition on Saturday but for my next belt test on the 24th of November. When my name was called and I marched out on to that mat, I felt like a million bucks. Like everything I had been practicing for had come to this moment to show the judges what I had learned and how I’d improved. I was really nervous though too because the several days leading up to it, I had been doing hammer fists in place of my down blocks.  I really didn’t want to forget those and wanted to try to remember to put my “looks” into the kata too. This is where you look in the direction of the invisible bad guy before you make your next move.  After watching the video, I remembered some but not all looks but my shirashi steps (sliding your foot from one step to the next so you are never out of balance) have come along nice and they looked better than I thought they did. Check out the video below of my latest kata and the one at the very bottom is the very first competition I did on June 21st as a white belt.

I also decided to try kumite (sparring) at the tournament. I was REALLY nervous about fighting since I never had done it before but I’ve been going to sparring classes for a couple months so I at least felt better prepared. I was bracketed with my friend Amanda from my class, a brown belt and a purple belt. I got to fight against the brown belt and we fought first in our division. The match was really close and as time went on I was feeling more and more confident about my ability to fight. We went back and forth most the match and time expired before either of us reached eight points so we went into sudden victory overtime. A minute or so into overtime and she scored just a split second before I did and won the match. I ended up taking a bronze medal but I am not at all disappointed about it. In my eyes it was a gold. I accomplished exactly what I wanted to at the tournament and hope to try it again the next time I compete.

The day was really fun and I walked away feeling very accomplished. It is the best I’ve ever competed and I’ve decided to compete in a bigger tournament in December and possibly in the State Games of America this summer. I never would have guessed that I would have this much fun doing karate. I can’t wait to be a black belt and compete against my black belt friends and my instructor.  Oh, one more thing . . . I just want to congratulate all of my Community Karate Club friends who competed. I was especially proud of my friends who competed for the first time. Can’t wait to see how you do in your next tournament. Hope you enjoy the videos. Please leave me feedback on what you think. I love to hear what others think of what they see.

Video of Heian Shodan at the 11/15/08 Tournament

Video of my very first Heian Shodan competition on 6/21/08

YAY! Rob and I finally did it. We are finally yellow belts in karate and it feels great. We already started learning some of our yellow belt kihon (blocks, kicks and strikes) and self defenses and they are fun. Most of the self defenses have cool pressure points and one of them has a really cool “arm bar” that you can put the “bad guy” into. If done right it could really hurt someone.

Yesterday we learned most of our kihon for yellow belt and I feel like I have three arms, two left feet and no balance.  Tyler was having too much fun laughing at me trying to figure out the elbo strike and I got really dizzy trying to learn the spinning back kick.  Guess it’s going to take a lot of practice at home to get these down before a stripe test or the final belt test.  We were also disappointed to learn at yellow belt we don’t learn any new stick flow drills but this will give us some time to perfect the ones we already know.   I can’t wait to see what else is in store for us ahead. It’s way exciting so far.

Check out the video slide show below of our belt test to get our yellow belts. (more…)

I just ran across this on a friends profile on MySpace and thought I would share my results.  I’m amazed actually.  It’s really close to the truth.  Take the test and reply to my post and let me know how you did.  I’m interested to see if anyone got “similar” results. Check out my results here . . . (more…)

On Friday night, June 27th at 7pm I participated in the Central Colorado Springs Relay for Life. It is a fun event that takes place for 12 hours. They say “Cancer never sleeps and for 12 hours, neither will we” so we walk from 7pm to 7am as a team in order to celebrate survivors and remember those lost to cancer. I ended up walking 22.5 miles for the night around the track at The Grace Center and raised $200 for Zach’s Team and for cancer awareness and support.

The weather was wonderful and as the opening ceremonies got underway we thought we might see lots of rain. Instead, we had a few sprinkles for about 10 minutes or so and lots of rainBOWS.  It was soooo cool.  Read (more…)

The boys have their final regular season Panther inline hockey tournament today. Check out the schedule here.

Join me at The Grace Center in Colorado Springs in the celebration of those who have survived cancer and remembrance of those who have lost the fight. If you would like to join my team click here . . . Zach’s Team or to help me in my fundraising efforts click here to Donate

Thank you to everyone who supports me and my team in our efforts to raise money for cancer research.

The American Cancer Societies week long celebration for Relay for Life. Stay tuned for upcoming events and join myself and my team and help raise money for cancer research. Check out Relay Week

Update 6/3/08:

Schedule of Events

June 22 - Sky Sox Baseball Game and Relay Week Opening Ceremony

June 23 & 24 - Take a Bite Out of Cancer at participating restaurants

June 26 - Cancer Survivor Dinner Celebration

June 27-28 - Relay For Life Event