Student section

Oneonta Taekwon-Do sent two representatives to Grandmaster Kim’s April Championship in New York City. This is the first time anyone from our school has gone to compete. Both students returned with trophies. We are very proud of Mr. McCabe and Finn. We greatly appreciate their commitment and the time dedicated by Finn’s dad, Richard for making the drive.

What follows is Finn’s summary of the day.  Please be sure to congratulate Finn and Owen on their accomplishments!

On April 24, a sunny Saturday morning, I took a trip with my father and my cousin Owen, a blackbelt, down to Manhattan in order to attend Grandmaster Kim’s Interschool Taekwondo competition. After our long, multiple hour drive, and after finding adequate parking, we arrived at Master Kim’s to find the place packed almost shoulder to shoulder with young students and their parents.

The kids picked out their breaking boards, and then we all sat for Master Kim’s speech. The day’s events started with the junior demonstration team, doing board breaks and multiple participant patterns. At one point, they even did Choong-Moo with 6 people standing in a circle. Next on the list was the junior competition, starting with board breaks, then patterns, and then free fighting. I recall one small girl whose favourite kick was a counter-attacking back kick. She looked like a mini tornado!

After the kid’s competition, it was time for the adults to begin. The competition started again with board breaks, in which I broke two boards with a left back kick, two boards with a right back kick, and a board with a punch. I earned second place. After that was the pattern section of the tournament. I performed Do-San, after a gentleman recommended that I perform the pattern that I most recently passed a test for, as apposed to performing a pattern that I had recently begun practicing. I won second place in this, as well.

At last came the free-fighting. I fought a yellow belt with a green stripe, the only opponent in my belt range and weight class. After two rounds, we were tied two for two. The judges decided it was time for sudden death. Taking a note from a blackbelt interim test I once saw, I decided to strike quickly, immediately after the sparring high-five with a left punch to the center of the pad. One of the judges decided that this was bad sportsmanship, and decided to deduct one point from my score, effectively killing my chances of winning. After speaking with Grandmaster Kim, the judges decided to simply start sudden death over again. I struck quickly, with one or two combinations, finally sticking a front turning kick to the chestguard of my opponent. I won first place in sparring.

Owen had won a first place trophy in sparring and a second place trophy in board breaking. Finally, after a long day, we decided it was time to go home. I suppose I’ll leave out the boring part of the story about the terrible restaurant and nearly running out of gas in Worcester.