My first Fight

To come in completely green and doesn’t have a clue of what to expect is pretty scary. I stand there with a new yellow belt I got just before Christmas. Mentally prepared but still can not help trying to check the others opponents. Totally Green, yes .. you feel quite alone. Also hoping that it will go well for the others in the club. The schedule comes up and I realize that it’s an hour left until the fights starts. I begin to move a little bit to soften the joints up, but at the time for some reason can gaze between the clock and try to check out my opponents once again. Are they big, small, thin, thick? Does he looks like he has been training a long time, what posture has he? Back to the clock, fifty minutes left. A team-mate goes up to fight and runs a really hard match. Her opponent has anything but a good ukemi. The third time she falls  into the mat, she flicks the side of her head into the mat and then cant hold back, she screams of pain. But the fight is not stopped because she didn’t give in. My team-mate wins the gold in her weigh-class.

We are four in my class. A bit of a fat group it feels like. I can say that i am the lightest of them all. With my 89 kilos, and the other weighs between 95-99 kilos. Twenty minutes left and I feel fairly well, keeping cool, the body heat and feel prepared on going up. Viewing the board again and a friend from another club comes up behind me and wishes good luck. Ten minutes left, I go up to the edge of the mat and get hold of my belt and tie it. Nerves are on edge and you hit a gaze straight across the mat where my head coach sits with his wife. Once gets a nod from him and the referee welcome us in, now, it”s time .. No turning back, I just HAVE to do it.

The match starts and I meet the groups heaviest opponent in 99 kilos .. Must had a complete brainfreeze and everything just freezes for me. He does a Koshi guruma and that I did not even counter it, well i don’t know why.. Fifteen seconds later, he gets a Wazari on Kesa-gatame. The match is over .. in total it took thirty seconds and i realized I was beaten. I had signed up and agreed straight into the competition to try to have as much fun as possible and get to know new people, seeing good judo alongside the mat and to experience how it works in a judo competition. I lost all of my three matches so that was a disappointment. Much depends on experience and a fairly short time in judo but I can not motivate the kids in the club where I am a coach to start competing if I dont know myself how it’s like to compete. To sum up the day, I had a lot of fun, both on and off the mat, met new friends and got with a vengeance to where I am in my judo. Registration for the next contest is already done, and until then it is training training training.. But I did get a medal anyway for my fourth place .. But the most important thing for me was that I got very good memories of my first competition and i am hungry to fights some more.

 

Best Regards

Tommy Lindfors