Yes! I did it!
I mentioned taking up the martial art of Tae Kwon Do again for the second time in my life in one of my first blog posts on here.
In the post I said Black Belt or BUST! and quite honestly over the last 3 years, there were a few times where I felt literally busted! My AS clinician had voiced concerns about sparring and getting hit when we discussed it just after I started. I told her not to worry, however I did go on to suffer a cracked rib on two occasions – one from a black belt in the club with a mean jumping spin sidekick and one from a professional kick boxer who used our two hour class as a warm up for his class!
So following a 20+ year gap in training I returned to Tae Kwon Do with the help of interest from my then 9yo step son. He sadly stopped after failing a grading which he hadn’t had time to prepare for. To be fair to him, he was doing about 6 after school clubs and you don’t get tested in football or cricket or cross country running, so I understand his choice.
By the time he left, which was probably 20 months or so into the training, I had already decided I hated sparring and had little if any will power to continue. How on Earth was I going to last another year!?
Grading regularly helped give me a sense of progressions and achievement, which is why I only missed two gradings in all. A 3 month gap between gradings I can do, but missing one would mean a 6 month gap. If you imagine my will power is a piece of gum, stretch is too far and it gets thinner and thinner and eventually breaks. I was worried I wouldn’t bother going back.
Truth is, the first one I missed due to holiday season getting in the way, the second time I wasn’t allowed to grade due to not clocking up enough hours against some chart. The number of hours had never been brought to my attention and since I could perform the moves for the grading, why shouldn’t I be allowed to grade? Sadly, the club didn’t see it that way and I had to hold off for another 3 months. At this point I felt like leaving.
It was also around this time I was struggling to break the required boards. I had a choice of two kicks, front or side and then one arm technique. Whichever kick you used, couldn’t then be used in your next grading, for the black belt.
So I opted for front kick as I knew I could break boards with a side kick and wanted to save that for my black belt grading. Trouble is, front kick is useless and if use my powerful side kick first, then I have to use either a front kick or round kick for the black belt grading. Round kick in theory is powerful too but everyone worries about breaking their toes when doing it. I was beginning to think I’d never reach a black belt. If so, what was the point of the last two and a half years?
Many times I felt no one understood my condition and what it meant for my joints. It’s nice to be treated like everyone else right? But really I needed a little support and when it never came I couldn’t help feel negative about the sport. But I took those feelings and decided it was a fight between Tae Kwon Do and me and I wasn’t going to loose!
In the end I went with side kick to guarantee I would break it. Then if I failed at black belt at least I got to senior red.
Thankfully I wasn’t alone in the journey to a black belt. Another chap, much more flexible than me was at the same stage and another chap who had been ‘stuck’ on senior red for years, because he had used up his preferred kick, was keen to grade at the same time rather than see us two grade and get black belts before him!
In the end we all graded on the same day, I performed my form (pattern of moves), board breaking kick and board breaking arm technique first time without a problem.
The sparring was OK and they made it harder by pitching us against a rather flexible, younger and taller black belt. I got a clip across my face which is my HULK trigger point and said, ‘not the face’ to which he said, “learn to block then”. At this point I felt more like an oldie telling off an younger upstart than ever and moments later he received a punch to the head, to which he said “I didn’t realise we were hitting people as they walk away” and I said ” better learn not to turn your back in a fight then.” (we hugged at the end of the grading btw – I don’t hold grudges 🙂
I didn’t enjoy it, I have never enjoyed sparring or the feelings it generates in me. Others don’t seem to mind but I figure if you don’t enjoy it, you don’t do it, but not gaining a black belt would be like giving up on reaching the peak of a mountain climb when the peak is in sight. I’d regret it forever.
Thankfully all 3 of us passed and I did it in front of my Mrs and 2nd youngest. I’m proud to call myself a black belt, the sense of achievement is really important to me, senior red belt for the rest of my days would never have done, it carries no kudos. Of course I will milk the status till my dying days, but as I suspected, no one other than me really cares. For friends and people I meet, I could have made the whole thing up. No one checks if it’s real, no certificates or trophy changed hands. There’s no public or private record other than a rack of coloured belts gaining dust in a cupboard that I could have bought of the internet.
Sometimes achievements big or small are just about what it means to you and this meant a lot to me.