Sparring

For the first about nine months in your Tae Kwon Do life, your main goal is to learn the basics and be able to competently accomplish many of the various techniques the we use in Tae Kwon Do. You then set out on the journey of perfecting your technique. We are taught never to use our techniques on another person unless put in a life threatening situation or someone else is in need of our protection or help.

Sparring is one of my favorite Tae Kwon Do activities, there is nothing else like pushing yourself to the extremes. Finding out exactly how fast you are and how fast your opponent is. You learn to react off of your opponent so much quicker than you thought you could. Everything is a quick fluid moment. You must learn to relax in order to be the best that you can be.

You exchange kicks back and forth, like testing the waters. You need to learn about your opponents, find his flaws and see if he can find yours. You learn to counter off of him and you find out if he's as good as he says he is. When you finally sense a familiarity with his style, or he does with yours, that's when the battle finally begins.

You rush at him with all your might, hopeing to scare him with a show of your talent. If that doesn't work you try and try again, because if your opponent shows fear you've basically won the battle hands down. As you duck and dodge kicks, you might get kicked lightly but nothing to distract you from your goal. Bam, you get an opening in on him, you sense him losing track. You follow through with another kick and then another. He senses the battle is being leaned towards in your favorite, so he moves out of the way. Then it gets really dangerous because he starts to plot his revenge.

He at you know with not only technique and expertise, but with rage and other emotions. Hopefully he will over-do-it and let his emotions cloud his mind, but if not you had better get ready. You pinpoint the precise moment for you to make your move and as it comes, you lash out like a whip. Your feet tangle and it becomes a struggle for power and pride. The one that lasts the longest will win, and hopefully it will not be him. You see him tire a little and he sets his guard down a little. Suddenly he comes in with his last burst and then he's lost focus. You counter with some of your left over strength and then "Whack!" the match is won, you get your hand held high and you know that you still can play the game.

Everytime I spar, I learn more and more about myself and about how I can better myself. Not everytime is a winning time, and not everytime is a losing time. Sometimes the winner is actually the loser. When I lose I automatically motivate myself to try a lot harder the next time. I always take away something from my opponent and you will surely see me in class the next day trying to figure out what went wrong for me during that match, and I wil indefinately be improving on whatever I can, whenever I can.