Erieversible

Today our lives revolved around the 7th Annual Great Lakes Open Taekwondo Championship.  It was held at Penn State Behrend and the 10-year old was competing in 3 events as well as involved in the “Tiger” demonstration team.  It was always going to be a full day, and so it proved.

The demonstration team practiced late yesterday and were there early this morning for last minute practice.  I’m told they were very good (I was on taxi duty with the 5-year old) but I can’t help feeling that far too much effort went into the demonstration routine and not enough into preparing the students for the competition itself.

In the end our son finished 2nd in the standard forms competition, for which he won a trophy.  He finished 2nd in the Grand Champion Poomsae competition, but that’s a winner takes all style event so he came away with nothing except the tiredness to show for it.  Finally, he won a bronze medal in the sparring.  All in all a satisfactory end to his first experience of competitive events in the US.  While the basics seemed to be similar to other competitions he has experienced, the sparring areas were much smaller than used in the UK - I’ll have to check which (if either) is the regulation size.

The early evening was spent updating the taekwondo section of his website, so now he can send emails to his friends at his Isle of Man club and refer them to the details!

Today the 10-year old had his first session with the taekwondo demonstration team. The routine involves the use of nunchuks. Not the sort that go with the Nintendo Wii, but heavy things that hurt. In the same 24 hour spell a Cuban taekwondo competitor at the Olympics kicks a referee in the head. I’d have thought referees were somewhat sacrosanct, and am now wondering where parents fit into the overall ‘target’ rules.

As the aforementioned Olympics draw to a close I’d like to raise the flag to ‘Team GB’.  I think whichever way you juggle the figures they have ended up 4th in the medals table with more medals than they have won for 100 years.  Great Britain may have lots wrong with it, but that sort of sporting performance deserves a mention.  Well done to the team.

As for 2012, the rest of the world is about to be introduced to Boris Johnson.  Gulp.

Tomorrow our son’s Taekwondo club is having a day at the beach.  Some training, some demonstrations and a picnic.  We have known about this since….quite some time ago.  So of course we are well prepared for the event.  Not.  With all the spare time we seemingly have, we can’t get organized.  Partly that is because we don’t actually have a lot of spare time and partly because we are not able to get into any sort of routine.  When the kids start school that will help towards a routine, but what we really need are jobs.

On the subject of school the kids were assessed today.  We have a meeting on Monday to get the reports and to talk through what should happen.  So, further news on that delayed until next week.  They were astonished that no measured assessment had been taken for either child during their Manx schooling so far.