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|  | On the 25th
of November 2012 Shaftesbury TKD was lucky to be joined by Master M. Wood VII
Dan for, what can only be described as, a top rate seminar and grading. (A very
big thank you to Master Wood and his family for travelling all the way up here
so early on a Sunday morning.) This
grading was not like any other I had attended before however, as this was my
and three other of our member’s black belt grading, and I have to admit that at
the beginning of the day I was absolutely terrified! But after a talk to Master
Wood about my nerves I calmed down and managed to push aside my anxiety to
enjoy the day. We kick started the day
with an energy sapping red and black belt class: Some would say that a few press
ups and sit ups and star jumps and tuck jumps aren’t all that tiring… But at
10am on a Sunday morning with just a slice of toast in your stomach it is a lot
like hard work, but much enjoyed hard work at that! After our warm up we got
onto some very handy step sparring moves that are part of the new syllabus and
thankfully we all managed to pick up the new combinations without too much
trauma, although after we had finished one set and moved onto the next I had
already forgotten the previous moves. Master Wood even managed to get in a bit
of bag work-kicking combinations-before time was up and we had to end our
lesson and get ready for the coloured belts Once
everyone had arrived, Master Wood got started with a very informative lesson on
the fundamental movements and how they should be performed which I certainly
found useful and I’m sure the junior members of our club learnt a lot from it as
well. It seems shameful to say that when asked to demonstrate my patterns my
stomach churned as I could see myself going from Do-San into Dan gun and
failing my grading before it had even begun. Then there was also the looming
terror of being asked that one question you don’t know, you know
everything else… just not that. I am very glad to say that I didn’t
completely mess up my patterns though and I knew the answers to the questions I
was asked, so all in all the lesson went on without too many flops The
younger ones really seemed to enjoy themselves and suffice to say they all paid
attention really well and I personally am very proud of them! Master Wood
managed to cover something that every person would find useful by telling us
the theory of some moves (more helpful to the seniors) and just general
teaching of how to complete a movement. Although the class was very good and
enjoyable, there was one thing that scared me, a lot: I had to fill out my
black belt theory exam. At first I panicked and racked my brain just forcing
the information out, but then it occurred to me how fast I had been ticking the
boxes; I slowed my pace and calmed down. Then all the memories of reading
text’s over and over again and the sticky notes in my room came flooding to me
and I could see the answers straight away… I made a few mistakes, but I’m only
human! Anyway, I eventually finished (after reading through every answer around
fifty times each) and could join in the class again which felt like it ended very
quickly Soon
enough that dreaded time came when the actual grading started. Sitting at the
back of the room and watching the students, most of whom I’d taught their
patterns, was the most nerve racking thing, even more so than my own grading!
No… that’s a lie, I was terrified for the entire time. But none the less, it
wasn’t a nice thing to see someone I’d taught go wrong or struggle and not be
able to tell them and help them, but everyone did really well and there weren’t
any huge disasters, of course a lot of the time I was either panicking about
breaking or rushing through my patterns to make sure I wouldn’t get up and go
completely blank and stand there in the middle of the hall looking a little bit
dim and most probably crying my eyes out in the process. The one part I really
paid attention to was the breaking because as anyone who knows me is aware of,
it used to scare me to death. No matter how hard I kicked that board nothing
would happen! So in the end I resorted to picking up tips - Watching my friends
smash through the boards with ease made me determined to do it, for the soul
reason of not letting myself down. Then there was also the sibling rivalry to do
better than my brother for extra motivation. I’m happy to say that all the kids
were very well behaved and attentive, both when they were grading themselves
and when they were sitting at the back of the room waiting to do so. Master Wood
was very encouraging and somehow managed to keep them all calm! I think now
would be a good time to congratulate everyone who attended the grading and to
tell them to keep up the good work!
Then came the time for the black
tags grading… That was my self, Ady Prins, Michael Prins and Luke Almond, I
don’t know how they all felt but I was absolutely horrified. When my name was
called I could feel myself shaking and my legs turn to jelly as my body was
screaming at me to collapse to the floor and not even attempt to grade.
Thankfully, I went against my instincts and quickly made my way over to the
centre of the room. Then it began; step sparring, in which the lesson before
hand flew out of my head and a lot of the time I found myself stuck for what to
do, just picking random moves without much logic going into the moves I chose. Sorry
to say, but I have no clue how the others did in their step sparring because I
was far too busy focusing on my own actions.
It seems safe to say that patterns
were the one thing that worried me the most, not the thing I struggled with,
but the thing I was worried about. At least the only thing that can go wrong
with breaking is… well, the board not breaking. But when it comes down to
patterns there are so many mistakes to be made: you can go into another pattern
during a basic one; you can completely forget all of the patterns you have ever
learnt or you can not complete the moves fully and end up getting a score not
even worth mentioning. To start with I was able to keep my nerves at bay
because we were all up together, doing the patterns together, no one person
being the centre of attention. But then, Master Wood asked us to perform Choong-Moo
on our own. Nerve racking doesn’t even begin to describe it. I’d done patterns
on my own plenty of times before in practising and competitions, but this time
it meant something more; this was the difference between getting my black belt
and remaining a black tag… I thankfully the pattern had stuck in my head and I
only made tiny technical errors that were quite easy to work out.
Breaking: this was the point in the
day that almost brought me to my knees in tears, although I think I did a
pretty good job at hiding my fear. But, what was it that had gotten me so
worked up? Well, it seemed to me that I was going to have to attempt to break a
brick. My voice of reason was telling me that this was a ludicrous idea and
actually against the rules because of my age but I couldn’t shake the feeling
that it was going to happen. The panic rushed through me as Ady Prins stepped up
and showed us how it’s done. I was glad to be wrong
All in all, a very successful day
for the club, congratulations to everyone that graded and another huge thank
you to Master Wood and his family. Written by: Kelly McNee - 20th January 2013
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