December 17, 2008
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National Black Belt Grading at MVD

Once again we were pleased to host the National black belt grading.  MVD had 4 candidates.  Sempai Conway & myself (Jill) for Nidan & Sempai’s Estelle & Haines for Shodan.  It’s almost faded into a distant memory now but the first highlight for me was being at the head of the run.  A fantastic day in Welly & about 50 of us ran down past Te Papa in full dogi doing the full mating call.  Ha ha, I confess I picked the route for gratuitous advertising.  I saw a group of guys running in dogi when I was 10.  They were all HUGE and bald with chests like coffee tables (in my memory) but it planted a seed that finally turned into something when I hit 24 so I always think there may be some skinny kid who will see us doing knuckle pushups on the gravel & will think “that’ll be me!” & history will repeat!

Another highlight was grading with Sempai Conway who started Kyokushin at MVD, Sempai Kapi who runs Hamilton dojo and Sempai Warren Gabb who has been around forever too.  All three are big men, big fighters, nice guys and Kapi & Warren run dojos & Conway is a fantastic instructor at MVD.  It was awesome to grade in their company.  It was even fun when Chris decided Kapi’s partner AND Conway’s partner AND my partner should all attack me at the same time during the self defence.  Love those heavyweights!

I can’t really give a commentary on the other candidates because I was so engrossed myself but I can share what an extraordinary experience it is.  I was pretty happy with my fitness because I’d been highly motivated to be at my fittest & it did pay off with all but the fighting being quite fun!  I crashed earlier than I expected in the fighting but I did have a chest cold so that could be why!  It was a 7 hour grading which may be a record but a good supplement (NFS Super-enduremex, okay + Krealkalyn + HMB + Horley’s Replace + carbo shots + pure glucose) did the trick.  Why anyone doing a Kyokushin grading would NOT take supplements I do not know!  When I got home I was still bouncing off the walls & fine the next day too even though I’d completely lost my voice with the throat infection.  Unreal!  See me at grading time & I’ll sort you out ;-)

Another highlight was being stripped of my dogi top & being first beaten & then flayed with an obi during Sanchin kata.  My eyes went a little rounder when Sensei Rachel McLean started throwing heavy leg attacks in and the whipping made it pretty difficult to concentrate – apparently I was purple but afterwards my skin was zinging!  It felt awesome.  I think we need a Turkish bathhouse in Wellington!

The fighting was an overall fantastic experience… with a handful of low points.  Ha ha.  The awesome part of a black belt grading is getting to fight ALL the people!  Every time a new person came forward it was special because they’re sharing the experience with you.  Pretty much after six hours of hard training you’re at the mercy of your opponent so it’s quite an intimate experience being one on one and finding out exactly what their expectations are of you & them finding out how much you have (or haven’t) got in the tank!  We have an awesome community!  Big congratulations to Conway, Haines & Estelle, I hope they enjoyed it as much as I did!  All the other candidates too.  I’m also really grateful to my partner, Richard Parry, for looking after me on the day (Pamela & her ice too) and for letting me all but totally destroy his shoulder at practice.  AND I’m really grateful to Chris for being my inspiration.  It was only watching his yondan grading that made me realise ‘this is what we do… best I go do it!’

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