I spent the bulk of April 13th at an open martial arts tournament with some of my Shotokan Karate brothers (and wife) where I competed with seasoned fighters. I got hit a lot, nearly knocked out I think, bloodied my lip a bit, and my shins are absolutely buggered, but I had an awesome time. The photo below is of the judges awarding me a point, which is obviously an awesome experience, but I learned a lot more from the points awarded to my opponents.
I was able to watch my wife Shealyn compete and was proud but unsurprised by how well she did. Like me, she took some pretty heavy hits, but she didn’t give up and she made an advanced competitor work extremely hard for her points. She also took second place and got a pretty nice trophy.
I also got to watch Philip compete which taught me just as much as fighting myself. His mentality was incredibly powerful and I can honestly say that of all the people I witnessed at the tournament, he’s the one I would least like to get into a fight without outside of a dojo.
Finally, I’d like to thank Jesse for all the time and effort he puts into teaching karate to us, and especially for treating karate as combat training rather than a sport. I don’t train just to learn how to score points by tagging an opponent. So thanks again to Jesse and all of the seniors at Twin Falls Shotokan (Nick, Mark, Courtney) for helping us all train. According to Jesse, the biggest complement Shotokan Karate of America members can be given is that we fight like real fighters, and that’s something that was said about all of us who competed.
Dale Mallows
Twin Falls Dojo