Today it was really hot here in Coventry. It was also the busiest day of the tournament. Color belts and under 18's competed today.
The event is held in an ice arena about half the size of the Enmax Centre in Lethbridge. The competition area is the same size as a European Ice hockey surface. They have removed the ice and set up 16 rings. They ran for more than 11 hours straight today, processing more than 1800 competitors in this one single day.
Tickets were pretty much sold out with more than 2000 spectators + the 1800 competitors playing today, + the officials. In total there was more than 4000 people in the arena. It was organized chaos, and unbearably hot!
The day started with the official opening ceremonies and introduction of teams from 27 countries. It was an awesome experience to here them announce Canada, and we all cheered, stood up and waved. In the past they have had a parade of athletes, but this event has grown to over 3000 competitors, and there just wasn't room. Below is a photo and a clip from the ceremony, with about half of the competitors.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zpw8v9PEvvA
The only competitor today from Legacy was Jackie Addison, who did a beautiful pattern. Her division had 70+ Black Belt girls. She won her first sparring match before falling to a very talented American girl in a close match. We were all very proud of her.
The B.C. players had a great day winning three bronze and one gold in color belt divisions, an unbelievable performance by them. We have been travelling with most of them for about a week, and they are really a great crew.
Most of my day was spent in the company of Grand Master C.K. Choi. He is a wonderful man, and has rock star status in the U.K. I accompanied him for most of the time as he greeted people, signed autographs, and posed for pictures. I am sure I took more than 50 photos for other people, who asked me to work their cameras. He wore out a Sharpie pen today. We were both in suits and got so hot, we would have to leave the arena every half hour or so to cool off in the heat outside! Some people mistook me for his body guard, which I thought was pretty funny. During those breaks we had many wonderful conversations with him telling me about his youth and the early days of Tae Kwon-Do. I feel very privileged to have had so much of his time today. When he is finished here he will travel to Scotland, where he plans to film his sparring patterns which he invented to help students hone their fighting skills
Tomorrow the black belt adults go again with continuous sparring and team sparring. We have seen some amazing talent here, and I am sensing that they are nervous about their matches. I know they will represent us so well.
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