Thursday, July 2, 2009

Poomse 09

We had our first dojang only Poomse competition of the year last weekend. My youngest daughter and I both competed doing Tae Guk Oh Jang (my instructions).

The competition is organized into 6 different rings divided by age range. Within each ring, there are matches (for lack of an official term) of up to 4 people competing against each other. At most, 2 people compete at once with each pair taking a turn simultaneously. The people in the match are all of the same belt level and sex. Within each match, a 1st, 2nd, 3rd and 3rd (yes....I intentionally wrote 3rd twice) is awarded. Once everyone in the ring has competed once, all the 1st place winners then compete against each other to be champion of their respective ring. In this round, the contestants compete 2 at a time. However, the judging is across all the contestants in that ring. All the champions of the 6 rings then compete against each to be named Grand Champion in a similar fashion. To become the Grand Champion, you would have to win 3 matches.

In my ring, I would estimate there were a total of around 40 adults. Note that my school has about 400 students. In all the past poomse competitions, I've always placed second in that first round. Usually as a result of mental error on my part. Because of our "3 month sabbatical", I competed against different contestants this year. I'm not saying that had anything to do with it but I ended up placing first in the first round. I did not win the champion of the ring round. I was however pleased with my improvement and finally getting that 2nd place monkey off my back.

It also helped that I did the same form as I did in my last competition. My dojang rotates every quarter for the students between the Tae Guk Oh Jang and Tae Guk Yuk Jang forms for the belt levels Brown - Red. Sr. These are Gups 4 and 3 in my dojang. It takes a full year to get through these belt levels. Then when we become Red Executive, we start working on the next 2 Tae guk forms.

My daughter got a 3rd place finish. She didn't spend much time practicing that last couple of weeks and wasn't taking it very seriously. Additionally, she won a 1st place in our last competition and she let herself take it a little too easy because of it. In contrast, I'll be working extra hard to make it to the next level at our next competition in November.

1 comment:

Bil Repenning said...

Yeah for Child The Youngest. And good job ShaggyD0ug!
I'm so jealous!