Tournament, Take Two!

Caelan helping with scorekeeping while awaiting her turn to stage.

We've accomplished our second karate tournament in as many weeks . . . this one proved more challenging (to me, but mostly AFTER the tournament :)

Graysen finishing up his form

Graysen's group

We awoke at the 7:00 hour once again (shudder!), and drove two cars to drop Buck's vehicle off at work. He then drove us the remaining couple of hours to the tournament location. Once we arrived, he and I had to pay as "spectators" which is different than last time, but it was at a school this time, so that's pretty standard for athletic events.

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Brennen's group

The first challenge was seating--they only had half the bleachers pulled out, and we're a caravan of six with enough gear to fill a van, clothes, and a cooler. Eventually, after getting the kids changed into their uniforms (locker rooms were a new experience ... they couldn't imagine changing in the general *room*--they still all opted for bathroom stalls :), we found a section that we kind of squished ourselves into. There were only 8 rings, so things were moving a little bit more slowly, but we got to see some of the XMA (I think that's what it's called) performances, and they were very interesting! Loud music, yelling, flips and throwing dangerous looking weapons around . . . interesting! Caelan was asked to come and help with some of the scoring in one of the black belt rings, so she went off to do that.

Two medals!

G$ went to staging first. His ring was across the gym from us, so we had to sit on the floor to watch. He tied for third on his form (Gab said he missed a couple of lines; the kids have a hard time not being oriented the direction of the mirrors at their karate school, it kind of throws them off). In the *form-off* (IDK what it's really called :), he finished in fourth place. Next he won his first sparring match and moved on to eventually compete for 3rd place. 

Gab sparring a district champ

At this same time, Brennen had been staged on the opposite corner of the gym. I missed his first go at form, but Buck said he tied for first . . . well, then so did another kid. B was in a three-way form-off while G was trying to get that 3rd place sparring medal. G ended up in fourth, and was pretty bummed, but kept his temper which was awesome! 

B accomplished third after a second run through his form, cool! At this point we also discovered that having a cup (you know, the boy kind) was a requirement? B has never had a cup on ever, did not know they existed. Boy was I glad Buck was still there to buy one off the merchandise table and help the kid shimmy into it (or however that works) in the locker room! After that bit of hectic was settled, B competed in his sparring match, where we discovered (not in his favor) that a jump kick to the head is worth three of the five points needed to win. It was over so fast, B was so sad :( Buck was just getting read to leave, I'm glad (again!) he was there for both boys.

Gab's group

Oh, why was Buck getting ready to leave? Well, this is day 9 of his current work "week." He needed to be to work by 4 p.m. to work til 3 a.m. Our karate instructor offered to drive Buck to work, so we could finish out the tournament if it ran late (it did), and so we wouldn't have to drive two cars half way across the neighboring state. To make it even crazier--he got home at 3:30 this morning, and volunteered to come back to work at 11 a.m. so that he can have the upcoming blizzard days off (since our vehicles are not very blizzard-worthy).

Back to the tournament . . . it's now, 2 in the afternoon, no one has eaten, and Gab's being called to staging. B's group was so enormous, that he had to sit there (in that terribly uncomfortable new cup :) for HOURS. In fact, Gab's group was done with awards and pictures (and even lunch) long before B's group wrapped up! In the meantime, I'm ring-running . . . here, there, back and forth . . . whew! 

How cute is Little Buddy helping with the judging panel?!

Gab taking her job seriously

Gab's ring ended up right next to B's, so that was great! G$ was able to sit with a little guy from Colorado that he met, while watching other kids compete in B's ring, which meant I could watch him too :) Gab looked great on her form and ended up tied for second! At the form-off, she ended up with 3rd, but really liked the girl who got second, so she was happy about it :) In sparring, she looked much more determined than at the last tournament. She was able to knock the District Champ out of the bracket by landing a two-point head kick just as time ran out, which gave her a one point advantage and the win! In the championship match, she landed three kicks to the head (2 points each) which quickly got her over the 5-pt mark for the win! Yay!

Gab ran to get lunch, but was two bites into her sandwich when a black belt lady said, "We need you to help in the rings!" Graysen already was running points for competitors in another ring, so she slammed down her sandwich and ended up writing scores/record keeping in the ring that would be her sister's :)

Caelan kept trying to get the black belt girl to fight back :)

Winner winner, chicken dinner!

By this time, Cae was in staging (and then out of staging, and then back in staging)--with one other girl. An orange belt (that's like the first belt after the belt they give everybody to start ... that's the belt I got, lol :) They did manage to pull a 60+ year old brown belt into her group, but she was automatically eligible (well, each of the three of them were because they were the only ones in their divisions) for first place. Of course, C was disappointed that it wasn't real competition. She scored all 9.9s--a perfect score--in her form (officially recorded by her sister :). For sparring, they grabbed a third degree black belt, who basically let Caelan score points on her. But logically, she couldn't fight back; she was ranked three times higher and then some! So, C was bummed, but she got another first place medal.

Fun that Gab got to bestow Cae's medals :)

All of this took til after three in the afternoon . . . C finally got to eat, and by this time, her stomach had started hurting--8 to 3 with just a snack at a competition is kind of a long time. The boys started taking apart mats while I was taking pics of Cae's tiny group (Gabby got to award her the 1st place medals). I was proud of the kids all being willing to pitch in and help in whatever ways they were needed! It was good experience learning a different side of how tournaments work, and good for them to practice being helpful when they're available to do so!

Double first place

The boys got to be involved in the closing ceremonies, while the girls went to change back into their regular clothes. G$ became utterly fascinated with the idea of a protective cup and has talked of little else, despite his brother's assurances it's not the coolest thing ever :) He thinks if he gets one, he'll probably wear it every time he goes to karate class, and asked if I thought he could get one tomorrow if we go to have a lesson. Funny kid!

Gab got to be in Cae's group picture as a judge/record keeper :)

We got all our gear packed up as it was starting to look a little dusky outside, and yesterday I guess, was beautiful, in the 50s? So began the long drive home . . . I figured a 1/2 tank of gas got us there, so a 1/2 tank should get us home. I was mostly right :) The gas light came on as it got really dark. I planned to drive through a burger joint on the way into town, but the exit was completely blocked off! This had me exiting another up the road, which would have been fine . . . except for the train. We got stuck at a red light for a LONG time as the train slowly moved closer. By this time we were 2.5 hours from the last bathroom, super tired, super hungry, and super out of gas. We randomly picked a restaurant that we could reach around the train and headed straight for the rest rooms. We were seated a few minutes later . . . then Caelan started to cry, and Caelan is not a crier.

Good helpers, getting the "rings" taken apart and stacked

Her stomach hurt so badly that she was sobbing with her head down on the table, and still no waitress. We decided what were going to order, the boys were coloring and still no waitress . . . I said, "Let's just leave. It's ok. We're 15 minutes from home, we'll just go." So we walked out :) She was dizzy and not feeling well at all, and I knew she was just super lacking in calories. I had to get gas, because we got stuck in the traffic left over from the train (for like 10 minutes for two blocks, ughh!!), so I had her dig through the cooler to get a juice smoothie and a snack bar. She started feeling better as I rolled into the gas station.


I'm not a happy night driver, and I hadn't eaten anything but 2 cookies since we left the house at 8 a.m., so I had a screaming headache now at 6 p.m. (Buck had made me his famous choc chip cookies the night before, I'm so glad I packed us each one--oh, and I ate his because he left early :) We decided to drive through a sandwich shop . . . we were third in line, another delay, but whatevs, at least no one was crying and we had a full tank of gas. When it was finally our turn and I got my order, I counted, because I always do . . . and we only had four sandwiches. So I had to re-order the missing sandwich and pay again and wait again. 

Hooray! Good job Crew!

We finally got home and just flopped down at the table. What a day! My headache never really went away, but it did back off by midnight. I couldn't wait up for Buck so I went to bed. The whole time, Chauncey was super stressed out. He knew we left with Buck, but Buck did not come home with us, so he must have figured we accidentally left Buck someplace :) He stared at the exits and whined off and on for hours. I mean, how do you explain inventory to a dog??

Overall, it was a good day . . . but I'm glad we're not signed up for another one of these good days 'til April ;)