Randomness at its most Random: Dojo Tournament!

On Saturday my son competed in his first karate tournament. It was just the kids who go to the 4 dojo's for Nishime Family Karate, so it wasn't a huge competition, and the proceeds went a teacher at one of the dojo's who recently lost his father.

I was nervous for Brandon. He does an okay Basic One, but he isn't the strongest, and his sparring skills lack a lot. For one thing, he's FOUR. Many of the kids at his level are 5 and 6 years old. The difference of one year makes a huge difference developmentally. Second, he is not a consistent performer, because again...he's FOUR. One day he may do everything perfectly, and the next fall apart.

So we went into the competition with much trepidation knowing a loss here may turn his taste away from karate all together since he is still a little young and easily influenced by single events.

Brandon was in the first group to compete (I think they did that on purpose because the second group looked like bigger kids). Brandon was with a group of 4 other kids, all with different belts. I was a little confused. Having never been to a tournament before and my only experience being watching Karate Kid, I had no idea what to expect. There was a white belt (beginner), 2 white with purple stripe belts (2nd belt) then my son and another boy with the same belt (white with orange stripe). They had the 3 lower belts compete with kicks and sparring. Then they had the other orange stripe do a weapons kata, which I had never seen before.

Brandon then stood to do Basic One (Kata) with the other orange stripe. I have never seen Brandon do it so well!! I KNEW Brandon did a great job, so I had the camera at the ready when the judges made their call and got a picture of them ruling in Brandon's favor!

Next was sparring. The lower belts sparred against each other for first, second, and third place, then the 2 orange belts. I was happy because I knew that at the very least he would get second in this, which was still a medal so he would be happy. The boys started and Brandon lost the first 2 rounds. It was going about as well as I expected because sparring was not his strongest event. Then something kicked on in that kid's brain and he won the last 3 rounds, making him win the match!

The medals started and Brandon ended up with 2 gold medals and a trophy! He was so excited! We went to celebrate by chowing down on pizza with his buddies from karate.

Moments from Our Day...