MIT Sport TKD Blog

we celebrated july 4th in serbia by running through a giant rainstorm. the lightning provided fireworks, and the streets flowed with water almost like the charles in boston.

in poomse, alicia and i placed 11th overall in the world. we had to do a prelim round, performing taeguk 8 and koryo, and that placed us 11 out of 15. then, the order switches, and from the last place to first place, the semis are performed. we finally placed 11th again, and did not move on to the finals. we did our keumgang and taebek on center stage, and during the stomps and kiyups the whole stadium reverberated. i think it was our moment at the top of the world.

sparring has been going on for two days. in the first day, johnny nguyen (fin), terrence jennings (feather), anees hasnain (fin), and kasey mallard (feather) fought long and tough. i think that was the most inspirational day for me. johnny sparred really tough opponents after two straight days of poomse. anees was the first to kick off sparring with korea, and when she lost and felt really bad afterwards i was able to get to know her alot better by spending time trying to cheer her up. tj won a bronze after some intense sparring, inside the ring and outside (us cheering team vs brazil & russian cheering team). and kasey sparred until her foot broke, then threw a fast double in the last second to try to tie the score, despite her toe being in at least two pieces.

that’s not to say that today’s matches weren’t incredible either. cheryl krause (fly) had the toughest fight before her actual match – she struggled to make weight and only made it through with a lot of support. bonny su (welter) had some great matches against people bigger than her – she had to weigh in after drinking four bottles of water. james howe was probably another medal contender, and we had another cheering battle in a completely unfair fight against korea in which james should have won at least 4-2 but lost 0-2 because of some seemingly unfair judging. and kris uy (welter), the nicest huge asian guy ever, bruised or dislocated his rib, and now it hurts each time he laughs, which is all the time. he even laughs when he hurts from laughing.

to make this post not sound like a typical tournament summary (read the ncta email if you want a straight up summary), i’ll say that life here has become somewhat of a routine. it’s a good routine nonetheless. after your tournament pressure is gone, it becomes like a camp combined with a partial vacation. each morning, someone’s alarm goes off between 6 am and 8 am, and that whole time, life is a fuzzy blur somewhere between dreaming about taekwondo and waking up to face the reality of taekwondo. and if you’ve ever experienced a whole day at a tournament, cheering people, helping warm up, taking video and pictures, and maybe even getting a little mat time yourself, imagine doing that for days on end. it’s been 5 so far, and it’s not getting old at all.

as the time goes by, i find that i’m naturally becoming friends with these people, perhaps more than i usually would in your typical extended trip. maybe it’s because we’re all in some sort of common struggle that puts mind and limb at risk. maybe it’s because there’s always the common mentality that despite being a bunch of goofy college kids, we’re all really damn good at something, and we all have something to prove to the world. maybe it’s because every night we get a few more people who are no longer stressed out, and every night we progress to doing something more fun, and get to enjoy the company of the real people that became free that night, not their weight cutting, stressed out zombie dopplegangers.

tonight we took a team picture. it was under the arches of the village, under an intense rain, with lightning coming down on every side. as the other tourists and athletes took pictures with us, one guy who was from a different american delegation waved to us, took a picture, and said, “happy fourth of july.” so happy fourth, from the us collegiate taekwondo team, to you.

here are some images from this trip so far. travel to serbia via paris; practice during the first two days, poomse competitions day 1 and 2; opening ceremonies.

this morning people got up at 6 am to go get breakfast. i don’t know why they got up at 6 am to get breakfast seeing as how we hung out until 2 am. i didn’t get up, but i didn’t go back to sleep again. for the next hour or so, i laid in bed, and the only thing that could go through my mind was taebek.

today was the first day of competition for taekwondo, and the men’s and women’s individual competitors went. we went to the training arena at 9 am. it was a huge dome with three large rings – probably more than sparring ring size. the middle ring was elevated. we tried to get around the barrier and they gave some sort of excuse for it being for spectators or volunteers but be realistic, the majority of people watching will be the teams. so jason hwang smooth talked his way in – “let us go just for the next two matches, promise.” and he stepped across without even waiting for the woman to shrug dejectedly and let the rest of the US team in to sit directly behind the center ring.

the individual competition was scary. there was a mix of super amazing people and not so super amazing people, but everyone was definitely well prepared. the scoring was somewhat confusing and many countries who we thought would score lower got really high marks. korea got the only 8.0 and above – for both men and women – and even though the women ranged between 7.0 and 7.5 and the men were usually 7.5 to 8.0 the korean girl was the only to get a 8.13.

johnny and carissa didn’t place past the prelims. they divided the 19 men into two groups of 10 and 9, and the women into 12 and 12, and instead of doing a top 16 and then a top 8 for the finals, they just took the top half each time. we didn’t stay for the rest of the poomse so i didn’t get to see the finals, or any forms after taeguk 5 and 6. one girl from russia started doing taeguk 6 when it was supposed to be 5, and that completely screwed her up for the rest of the time.

tonight we’re going to have opening ceremonies. the weather is drab and wet and chilly. it’s like we’re in boston again. it should start at 8 but we have to attend events with the US delegation starting at 4:45. hopefully the pictures will be exciting, since the event, from the inside, will just seem to drag on. but nothing can be worse than the pan ams opening ceremony, so it’ll be fine.

tomorrow (thursday) is the day for pairs and men’s and women’s teams. we are pumped up.

6-30

this morning the men got up early to go for a jog. at 8:00. so i decided to sleep in a bit since we stayed up til about 2 playing poker the night before. but i couldn’t actually go back to sleep because i felt like i had overcome the jet lag. in reality, it was because i’d taken a nap until 2 am EST so now i was up for the rest of the east coast night.

today we had the flag raising ceremony. we got together with the US men’s waterpolo team, who all looked like large, blonde, mustached bears. there was also the US men’s and women’s basketball teams. they made kris uy, our 6′4 welterweight, look like a shorty. we walked up the red carpet to the flags, the same place we kicked outside yesterday. then we saw the Universiade Sparrow, and took a few goofy pictures with them.

the flag ceremony was nice and short, despite having about 100 US athletes there. when i say short, i mean time, because most of those people were either over 6 foot tall or over 200 lbs heavy, or both. i got the women’s bball center to take a few pictures for me, and when she reached up with my camera it reached up about twice my height.

we went to the official practice room a bit late because of the ceremony. there was a long tkd room with a long set of mats, and the spanish and australian teams had been there for a while. we finally got some room and kicked out with some team drills, and i felt really pumped with all the energy in the room. except my calf was getting more and more pained so i could only kiyup loud and pretend i was kicking hard.

on the way to and back from the training space, we took the C shuttle. and one interesting sight was that when we went over the bridge each time, you could see the slums that were under the bridge – old abandoned cars and tin foil roofs and clothes lines hung up between the trees. and there were lines of old abandoned trains with graffiti all over them and broken windows. also, everywhere you see wild/stray dogs running around, in ones or pairs, just hanging out in the streets. serbia is still an old city, with trash and industrial waste all over the place, a combination of the new athletic complexes and the old ruins from the US bombing in 1999.

we had a second workout at 7 or 8 pm today. by that time everyone had been napping for an hour and we were super tired. i was out of it until we did a few warmup drills, then my poomse felt pretty good. i also used a little gadget called “the answer” which was supposed to help you kick high and be stretched and warmed up after a minute per leg.

at night, we got our SWUG swag. nice USA jackets, nike warmups and shirts, and a few polos and a pair of shorts. it’s pretty sweet stuff. that also meant that we got our luggage back – it felt so good to have a real shower, a change of clothes and a shave. also, carissa and becca arrived so our team was all there.

tomorrow the individual poomse people, johnny nguyen and carissa fu, compete. we’ll be up at 8:30 to cheer them on.

6-29

Today we arrived at Serbia at about 3 pm Serbia time. the whole country smelled different – it was slightly smokey, like an industrializing country city. you could see distant smoke stacks beside the shiny new universiade buildings.

when we went to baggage claim, the luggage was gone. all of the ones we checked in boston, including the big ones that contained all the team swag, and the small duffle bags that had our emergency clothes in case the big ones got lost. i knew we should have kept them out but laziness got the best of us, the air france got the rest.

the serbian volunteers were very direct. as they talked about getting our bags back they were constantly shouting and gesturing at each other. we figured it was just the way europeans talk. and that explained the way jordan always talks. the drivers and other volunteers were basically what i imagine jordan’s friends and family are like.

we went to the “olympic village”, and even though it’s not really the olympics i guess we’ll call it that. here we saw all the different countries in their matching warmups, tshirts, polos, etc. and we, the american crew, walked through as a ragtag, nonmatching group of mavericks. i guess tomorrow we’ll get our stuff – we got one red polo, one blue shorts, one white tshirt, all way too big.

in the afternoon, after getting our room keys and credentials, we went to a nike store to train. yes, it was a NIKE STORE in which they were selling shoes and other gear, but in the back was an area with weights and an open space. since it wasn’t quite big enough for everyone to kick and do forms, we went outside to an area with a huge red carpet, and step sparred under the flags. pretty soon, a crowd gathered around us to take pictures and gawk at the taekwondo contingent. (keep in mind our ragtag clothing.)

the big adventure we had today, however, was when we all went to go to the team meeting that was on the 1st floor, with the lobby being the ground floor. coach linda buelle told us all to cram in to the elevator, but as the doors closed the elevator went clunk *CLUNK* and we would go up a foot then drop 6 inches. so for 15 minutes we were stuck in the elevator, with 13 sweaty athletes and three very sad looking volunteers. we kept banging on the doors and i thought that the oxygen would be running out, so i kept holding my breath until we finally pried the doors open. we were half way up the door and you could see the gears. i’ll upload images later when the rest of my luggage comes in.

the first day was full of adventure, i guess you could say that. losing all our luggage, kicking on the red carpet, then nearly suffocating (or imagining so) in an elevator. tomorrow should be just as fun.

today, i left for belgrade for the summer world universiade games. as i write this i am riding in air france 321, bound for paris, with jayson grant, alicia, karolina and sabumnim. it is 2 am EST and alicia the rest are sleeping comfortably in their reclined chairs. i am sipping the last of my heineken and listening to a bit of classiquai. we are headed to france, and to europe, and to the world.

i couldn’t recall when the last time it was that i left the united states. of course, tijuana and montreal don’t count as really being outside of the country. i looked in my passport, and the last time i was in beijing was sometime in 2000 or 2001. probably a post high-school graduation trip. so this time, going to belgrade, i am filled with excitement, to be competing at an international tournament with the united states team, to be in a completely different country, to be experiencing something i’ve never done before.

we have worked pretty hard over the past few weeks. along with other members of the new mit stkd poomse contengincy – rene and anye – almost every practice has been devoted to perfecting the backstance, adding power to the guarding block, keeping the bob out of the front stance, giving that side kick just a little bit more pop. poomse has breathed a new life into my taekwondo experience. in a way, it’s a completely different world of taekwondo. there’s no cutting weight, there’s no intense pressure to become a physical superman. but on the other hand, all the competition is now within. you fight against yourself to perfect your form. you have to overcome many different obstacles – laziness, inattentiveness, acceptance of imperfection. when you put on a helmet for sparring, you enter your own world. when you compete in forms, everything is still out there, and you have to find the right mental state without the aid of a stifling set of gear, or a blanket of cheering that covers up your doubts. it’s only you and your body, but the whole world is still out there trying to knock you off balance.

soon it will be morning and we’ll arrive in paris. it’s already a treat to hear the airplane crew speak a foreign language, and to inquire whether you’d like “quelque chose a boire”. and i can’t even imagine the foreign world we’ll be in when we enter the SWUG athletic village, and see the multitudes of flags, the different colors of each country parading around in large groups. and not only will there be taekwondo, but there are going to be many other sports – the top in the world of collegiate athletics. and we’ll be right there among them.

**

the moment i entered the airport, i was snapping pictures on my camera like a foolish tourist. and this was when i was still in logan airport, terminal E, international departures. the boston crew carried the SWUG swag in our suitcases because there were the most number of us leaving at the same time, so we each had a huge 50+ lb bag, another medium duffle, and other stuff. fortunately, except for jay, we didn’t have any sparring gear, so we could stuff the bags full of actual clothes to wear.

air france did not have any luggage charges, even though most of our bags were probably over what we thought was the limit. then, we promptly decided to check our second bags – why not? it’ll make the stay in paris and the trip through customs much easier.

ever since i was a kid, i’d loved airplane food. no matter how people complained, i always thought the vacuum packed food served in little plastic trays had an appeal that you couldn’t get at any gourmet restaurant. so when they passed out menus i started salivating – they gave us a choice of chicken curry or a salmon shepherd’s pie, with brownie, cheese, tuna cous-cous salad, bread, and tapioca pudding. and aperatifs! i grabbed a cabernet sauvignon, and finished alicia’s champagne. then i asked for a heineken, and now i’m happily settled down in the darkness blogging about this highly satisfying mile high culinary experience.

on the plane, we all sat in the middle aisle. i’ve always heard stories about how virgin america and other airlines provided free entertainment onboard, and i’ve only experienced this once or twice myself, so i was super excited about the personal tvs that also had music, games, and movies. i ended up watching an indian(?) film about kabbadi, which was really awesome except for the sudden twist plot in the end which really caught me off guard. well, it is a time to experience everything non-american, so no “watchmen” for me.

As i write this post I can count three people on my chat list who are cutting weight, and letting the world know of their misery. Adding myself to that list, it is obvious that taekwondo is more than just a hobby. It is a way of life that requires you to have a huge amount of resolve, and sometimes to make some uncomfortable personal sacrifices. To the public, this sport of ours is sometimes mysterious, sometimes awe inspiring, and almost always misunderstood.

Imagine if you were one of the basketball players on the other side of the big red curtain, and for about an hour each day you would be constantly distracted from your game by a rhythmic, thunderous yelling. During the brief waterbreaks you might take a peek around the curtain’s edge to see if there were any spare courts, but you would only see a horde of bare foot, colorfully outfitted people doing things with their feet that no basketball player would imagine doing. And, if you were one of those badminton players in Rockwell watching the beginning of practice, you would probably be struck by how sharp fifty people look, with their kicks and punches and even jumping jacks all completely synchronized. To any outsider, all of these things must be at once mysterious and awe inspiring. But what they don’t really see is how much of it extends into our lives outside of practice. If you chose to stay beyond the PE class, and perhaps even got your green stripe after your first semester as an actual club member, taekwondo becomes an inseparable part of our daily routine. Taekwondo, for those of us in the MIT Sport TKD team, is not just a curious hobby, but a way of life.

I am writing this article as a tribute to those who are now making the ultimate sacrifice for the sport of taekwondo and for the team. Those are the hungry individuals who are seeking enlightenment of their body and mind. If you have ever tried cutting weight, you know that during the week before the tournament, a strange obsession with calories and working out takes ahold of your body. I never understood why we go through this – is it because we are MIT students, and natural masochists? Or is it a different trait as MIT students, or as martial artists, that we can go to such lengths once we are devoted to some cause? Either way I have seen the resolve reflected in the eyes of people who have only one goal in mind – to get under that weight cut-off – whether they are a blackbelt cutting for nationals or a green stripe going all out in order to fight with their C team.

All of this determination will pay off, in the end. The moment that you step off the scale is probably the happiest moment in any tournament day. For me, that moment is as much a victory as any of the actual fights. But true to the sport, victory in both cutting weight and sparring comes as a result of weeks of training, and is not a outcome from the performance of just that one day. As taekwondoists, you will step off the bus and into the gym knowing that you have trained enough to defeat the scale, and to defeat your opponent. Whether you are rewarded with a gold medal or a bagel and gatorade, you know it’s well worth the fight, and more than deserved.

Tonight, olympic taekwondo started in Beijing.

First, let me say that it looks like fighting at the olympics would be AWESOME. There is one center stage, raised on a pyramid structure, with four corner judges sitting outside the yellow boundaries. The coach sits at the base of the pyramid while the two competitors fight, like gladiators on a pyre.

(from Day Life)

Tonight (rather, starting on Aug 20 at 9 AM Beijing time), the men’s and women’s fin/flyweight divisions fought. Included was American team member Charlotte Craig, the least spotlighted member of the US Olympian team, otherwise known somewhat simplistically as “All in the family.” You hear so much about the Lopezes that sometimes, it’s easy to overlook Charlotte, who also normally trains at a different studio (Jiro in LA, instead of Elite in Texas.)

But I have to say she came out blazing and her kicks were solid. You can see matches at nbcolympics.com, although I’m sure the finals matches will be much more interesting. I guess around this time (3 am) they are going to start the 2nd round of sparring, but I will probably be asleep soon, and will simply read about the results tomorrow.

I hope everyone gets a chance to watch the US team, as well as the other international superstars, fight through their brackets. On one hand, olympic taekwondo is such a high level of competition and is amazing to watch. On the other hand, you can really see that the basics we are learning are all that you need, but simply raised to a very high level of athleticism and experience. As we watched the match between Venezuela and Portugal, Master Sinn and I began to spar and kick hogu in my small studio apartment, trying to imitate the girls with the amazing left leg turning kicks. Yes, even the flyweight girls would beat me down.

The schedule and links to streaming taekwondo:

http://www.nbcolympics.com/taekwondo/index.html

hey everyone, for those who don’t know, Alicia, RDC and I are going to be competing at Senior Nationals one week from today. (No, not senior as in senior citizen.) We’ll be in Detroit on July 1st, weighing in and then pigging out, and competing on the 2nd. Others you might know will also be there – Jayson Grant, know for his on court dances, and Ana K from CW and some friday practices.

But that means this week we’re going to be miserable, because we are cutting weight. If you think dropping 6 pounds by next tuesday is impossible, you haven’t eaten Trader Joe’s High Fiber Cereal (yea yea that’s my real blog too. everyone and their mother has one). The good thing about it, i guess, is i will be beach ready next week. So Mary, plan a beach trip soon please!

If you’re around this summer, it would be awesome to bring some new people to the club. I’m having a great time teaching the beginners, and would love to have a large group of awesome new people like we did after last summer. And if you’re around, lets play more ultimate frisbee…even if i’m not just doing it to cut weight.