A first judo tournament

At the last day of their Christmas vacation, we had an unearthly early alarm clock because the boys would participate for the first time in a judo tournament.   Kabouter already had to get weighted at 8AM after minimum an hour drive with potential slippery conditions.  Ugh, stress and a very early alarm to give us time to drive very slowly but we made it very fine and early in Meeuwen-Guitrode.

I had not idea but the event was very big with participants from clubs from Flanders , Wallonia, The Netherlands and Germany.  It didn't take long before the hall filled entirely and Kabouter's age group was warming up on the mats, while Beertje and I had squeezed us a little spot with our books and iPad to start the long waiting on the uncomfortable bench. 
I could see that the other people (from our club but also others) were much more seasoned in the tournament circuit and came with campers, advice and routine and higher level belts.  Oh well, they'd only learn by participating. 

In a rush of the moment, when all children had been weighted, some pools were hung and the first names were announced to the mats and our coaches were running left and right to track the participants and try to help them.   

Kabouter's pool started quite fast so he had his 3 matches in the first hour.  He was probably a bit intimidated by the circumstances and quickly lost most of them with ippon but he showed more aggressivity and fighting power already by the 3rd game.  At the first moment he was quite disappointed by losing all of them but by the end of the waiting time he enjoyed himself again and watched the matches of other club members. 

And then we waited for a couple of more hours until all the pools were finished and the age group of U13 had to line up in a 20 minute name-calling ceremony to all get a medal. Ugh, I am so sorry but so boring. And in the mean time the U11 had arrived and was getting ready so Beertje could dress up and get weighted but that meant that the hall was filled with twice as many people.  Don't you dare to move an inch from your bench of your spot was taken.   Not ideal for high sensitive people.  To be honest, I did not enjoy myself very much anymore but I did my best to concentrate on my book. 

U13 participants from the Judoclub Leuven

Right after the U13 participants had got a medal, the U11 pools were hung and started immediately.  Also Beertje was in a pool that got on the mat immediately. While Beertje had spent the previous hours in the zone with his iPad, oblivious to all the fights around him, I doubted his motivation to fight. But to our surprise he attacked immediately and did really his best to give it a good fight.   His first fight was very tight on referee's judgement but he lost.  The next two fights he twice quicly got stuck in a hold so he also lost twice with ippon. While he said he was ok, the disappointment was very visible in his body language. 

For some infuriating unknown reason a referee had left unexpectedly so the tournament got much delayed and our waiting game was even worse. But we endured and fetched some food. 

Late in the afternoon the U11 received their medals and then we were free at last after a very long day.  I had not anticipated not getting home before dark.  

But I learned to be patient and tune out all the buzz and the boys learned to lose. In the end we do think it was a positive experience so we'll check if we can make it to some (but not all!) tournaments in the coming months. 

U11 from Judoclub Leuven