Back from Diamond Nationals...video of a Zach fight inside..

[AdamKralic]

How D,

Just got back from Minnesota an hour ago. 7 hour trip each way...uggh. Anyhoot we know our ring...we get there 1/2 hour early before any events at all start...and park ourselves near our ring. Waiting, waiting, waiting...but that is typical it seems. Finally I look around and two rings over it appears that kids of Zach's division our fighting! I check and yup...they were. We trained for that division as it was his age group and height. Almost over when we got there...and there we saw that four other families did not know of the ring change either. No announcements. They must've tapped a group of boys and said...oh there has been a change come here. Didn't tap us. Those boys probably all came from a earlier event together is my guess. Maybe forms or weapons. We only signed up for sparring.

So Zach got to fight the other kids that weren't told...bah he got third. A parent and I both complained to someone higher up the food chain and got the option of running to another room and seeing if we could squeeze in a another division.

We took it...nobody else did. The division had much larger opponents in size...and I'd guess age as well as the average kid in the division was close to 1 foot taller than my son...and I'd guess fully through puberty.

Here was his first fight in which he fell behind 5 to 1 early on. He was quite upset about the judging during the fight...and I think he got mad. He stops over analyzing when mad imho...and just fights.

His next fight however he got killed. Hardest shots that he's ever taken by far...and the judge gave the other fighter mild verbal warnings...never took any points away. I mean my son's head was getting RAWKED. (I have seen my son get hit MANY times before...I am NOT over sensitive at all.) I was pretty upset but it is fighting...I never said boo...in fact was friendly and conversational afterwards with ref...talked about the fight linked above and how he was amazed when Zach first caught the bigger kid with the sidekick to the head...back to my inner thoughts though...when one fighter is huge, older and fighting a kid who is legitimately 40% smaller...you'd think a judge would try and limit the damage.

I would not go next year. Less organized than I imagined...less worth it than I imagined too. 14 hours of driving...and some day of fight ring change that wasn't even announced...kills my son's chances at going for what he came for. (fighting 12-13 year olds in smaller division)

[AdamKralic]

But the trip was not all karate either...

We went to the Mall of America twice and there I finally got my son on a real roller coaster! minnesota is a very pretty state in the fall overall and we had good food at every meal. (Yelp app is 2nd only to the gps app for importanc IMO) So a fun mini vacation for our family.

[sensei8]

Overall, it's the experience that's paramount, imho, over the win and lose. It's nice to win, but it's nice to lose! Both are learning tools for the MAist to aspire for.

Zach looked good!! It can be difficult to stop over thinking ones fighting at the moment...Emotional content, not anger!!

Thank you for sharing Zach's tournament!! Tell Zack I said...Train hard and there's always another tournament!!

[AdamKralic]

I will pass on the words to zach...thx. He has a small local tournament in November and then another big one (Aka grands) in January so there's more

Fun right around the corner!

[bushido_man96]

I thought he sparred pretty well. I'm not sure where the concern about the judging came into play came from, but I've got a different angle, too. From the watch, I think it was called pretty fairly.

As for the contact concern, it could have had something to do with him bumping up to an older division, where that level of contact may have been more the norm. Perhaps the refs didn't feel it would be fair to rest of the division if they had to hamper how they fought to adjust down to Zac's ability due to his age. But that's just a thought, though.

Overall, looks like he competed well, and if he learned something, then it was worthwhile.

[AdamKralic]

I thought he sparred pretty well. I'm not sure where the concern about the judging came into play came from, but I've got a different angle, too. From the watch, I think it was called pretty fairly.

As for the contact concern, it could have had something to do with him bumping up to an older division, where that level of contact may have been more the norm. Perhaps the refs didn't feel it would be fair to rest of the division if they had to hamper how they fought to adjust down to Zac's ability due to his age. But that's just a thought, though.

Overall, looks like he competed well, and if he learned something, then it was worthwhile.

Hopefully he did. I think that he did...but I'll know in how he handles AKA Grands. I expect the competition there to be as good or even better as the American midwest has a lot of the good fighters in the country imho. Plus a lot more people would be willing to take a mini vacation in Chicago than would in Minneapolis perhaps.

As far as contact goes...it was a lot in the next fight. But...Zach didn't have to get hit. So a lot of that is always on the person taking the shots.

[skullsplitter]

What is his division for AKA Grands?

[AdamKralic]

12-13 short AA

Idk about team as the 14-15 year old is single A. I guess it will depend on who does the 16-17 spot

[AdamKralic]

Are you coming skullsplitter? Bringing any young fighters with ya? What divisions?

I'd gladly say hi and mine you for nuggets of knowledge if you had the time...

[AdamKralic]

He is doing sword sparring and regular sparring in a upcoming local.

I'm excited as it was his call and a spur of the moment idea to add sword. He does fairly well in practice/class with it...so it'll be interesting to see that in a competition.