Rank Camp Day 3

I am sore, but not really any more sore than I’ve been in the past… it’s a good feeling, that ache that tells me I’ve pushed my muscles a bit further than they wanted to go. The worst part is the sleepiness. Just about the time we’re getting started each night is when I’m usually already in bed…

It will be worth it. I keep telling myself that.

When I tie on a brown belt after only being a blue belt for a week, it will be worth it.

When I get my black belt by March instead of July, it will be worth it.

When I see the improvements in my technique from a week of repetition and focused training, it will be worth it.

When I can be an example of hard work and perseverance to my son, it is worth it.

One of my classmates said last night that her decision to attend rank camp has nothing to do with jumping a belt. For her, it’s to get an infusion of that passion and motivation that keeps us going on our journey. I didn’t sign up to get that, but I’m getting it anyway. Thank you, Mr. H, for giving me a chance to remind myself why I love this sport.

Rank Camp Day 2

I survived the first night. Surprisingly, I have the full use of all of my limbs and my face is not (yet) hitting my keyboard, although I see a search for caffeine in my near future. Since I typically head to bed just after I get Little Man off to dreamland, 11 pm is obscenely late for me to be out on a school night. But as I said, it’s worth it.

Last night we spent a large portion of the two hours working on technique, which is far less glamorous than it sounds. It just means we do the same move over and over again until we get better at it. I must have done 8 dozen round kicks, but the improvement is already starting to show. Whether I can lift my legs to do them again tonight is another story.

The other thing we did last night is learn the first several moves of our forms. There are beginner, intermediate, and advanced students taking this Rank Camp, so our lucky instructor gets to learn (or brush up on) and then teach three different forms. The form I have to learn is called Hwa Rang (pronounced Hwa-wrong, with an audible h and a rolling r).

What’s that you say? I get to learn a form with the same name as one of my favorite characters on one of the (very) few video games I enjoyed playing as a kid? Geeky coolness!!

If you’re a child of the 80’s (like me), you probably played some Tekken growing up. Maybe you played Streetfighter or Mortal Kombat, but if you were really cool, you played Tekken. If you are indeed cool, you probably remember a certain young TaeKwonDo master named Hwoarang. Yes, pronounced exactly the same way as the form I’m learning. I suspect they got their name from the same entity. The Hwarang were a group of youth trained in martial arts in the Silla kingdom of ancient Korea.  

Therefore, I am geeking out. I might have to practice saying the name of my form in the Tekken-announcer voice.

Rank Camp Day 1

Eventually, I will go back and start at the beginning, but today I'm going to start with where I am right now, and that's Day 1 of my first Rank Camp, which will allow me to jump from the blue belt I just earned last week to a brown belt.

You don't have to be a student of martial arts to understand the craziness that is Rank Camp. You just have to have been a student of anything, ever. Rank Camp takes two months of material and crams it into one week - or in my case, since I have a prior obligation on the last two days, four days. That's right kids, I'm gonna learn 8 weeks worth of TKD material in four days. Starting at 9pm tonight, because in addition to being a martial arts student, I'm a working mom.

This week might be a blur of exhaustion and grumpiness, but on Thursday night when I realize the goal of shaving another two months off of my journey to black belt, it will be worth it.