Of course, I first blogged regarding the 2009 Funakoshi National Championships held in Somerset West quite some time ago already, but the other day Maria (who also trains at the Gordon’s Bay Funakoshi dojo) alerted me to the fact that a whole heap of photos have finally gone up on the main South African Funakoshi website as well, so of course as a trained blogger I feel the unshakable urge to point you guys to them as well!
So with no further ado, all point your browsers here: www.funakoshi.co.za/news01August2009.html
Back again? Good.
Of course, this post would be horrible short if I didn’t post some of the pictures right here and now, and so I’ve decided to pull a couple showing me in my full (unfortunately) “glory”! I must however warn you at this point that these images are unfortunately not suitable for sensitive viewers as I am rather ugly, fat and with a bad haircut in all of these that I appear in! You have been warned. :D
Look mom, there I am! The guy in the red belt in case you don’t recognise me! Actually, this was to be my only win on the day, confusing the judges into choosing me and my kata over training partner Gerrit and his! :) Ah, good times indeed.
Scarily, this photo is a stark reminder as to just how much I hate the fact my dogi shrank in the wash (and the fact that my belly is so big at the moment!). However, despite my ‘show tummy flesh’ tactic, it wasn’t enough to put off training partner Ian who went on to win the points match. (His clear height advantage really paid off for him here). Note bearded Ryan standing there looking on while resting against the pillar… just in case it falls over of course!
And now to something completely arb of course…
On the left is black belt sempai Gert, Birgitt’s husband, but more importantly on the right is the karateka all the swooning, drooling females nicknamed ‘Ken’ for the day. Note his particular height disadvantage (ignore is chiselled features and well groomed hair) and then take into account that he is one damn good fighter and karateka overall – in other words a man that I can really look level to! (Yes, this is a quip about my lack of vertical length)
And just because, I’ve included a picture of the karateka that was dubbed ‘Barbie’ for the day (the one on the left in case you were wondering). Unfortunately her face is rather red thanks to taking quite a few blows to it by this stage of the fight, and as you can well imagine, there were plenty of calls from the male crowd to the effect of “Noooo! Not the face, not the face!” with each falling blow. (Actually it ended up being a damn good match to watch – can’t remember who won though…)
Related link: http://www.funakoshi.co.za/news01August2009.html