UWTA Tournament

On Saturday, Asher and two other members of the UNC Taekwondo Club competed in the Northern Colorado Taekwondo Open, a UWTA Tournament. (Three more members had planned to also compete but ended up getting sick.) Fortunately, the tournament was here in Fort Collins, so Nathan and I were able to go watch.

Asher competed in five of the seven events: traditional poomsae (forms), point sparring, rapid kick, board breaking and combat weapons sparring. He'd never competed in those last three events and appreciated the experience. 

(Above: Asher competing in traditional poomsae, combat weapons sparring and point sparring...and the three UNC clubmates at the end of the tournament.)

Overall, Asher took home a first place (in rapid kick), 3 second places and a third place and had a great time. :) It was wonderful watching him and his clubmates...and highly entertaining watching and cheering on all the younger kids.

It reminded me of Asher's tournaments when he was younger...

Here he is in February 2011 at his very first intramural tournament at Karate West (just for members of Karate West to give them all experience with how tournaments work)...

...and in September 2012 he competed in forms at a regional tournament down in Denver...

And then in September 2015 he competed in another regional tournament in Loveland to get sparring practice before his black belt testing. 

(This was actually not part of the competition. This was another Karate West member (in blue) helping coach Asher (in black) before his sparring round.)

And that was pretty much the extent of Asher's tournament experience (beyond the intramural Karate West tournaments as a competitor and then as a judge when he got older) until Saturday. So happy that he joined his taekwondo clubmates in competing...they're already talking about doing it again. :)

(And thanks to those who contributed to their fundraising efforts! Some of that helped pay for their registration fees.)