The club has numerous opportunities each year to test our skills through local and regional tournaments. Events usually include kata and kumite for individuals and teams. Team events consist of 3 members plus an alternate, and there are usually separate categories for men and women.
Tournaments begin in November!
The 13th annual Collegiate Traditional Japanese Karate Shiai was held in Patten Gymnasium, hosted by NU! Full results can be seen here. Prior to the tournament, Mr. Anthony Milevsky provided all competitors with an energetic group class, and after the tournament, most competitors enjoyed a wonderful dinner at Thai Sookdee in Evanston.
The University of Chicago Shotokan Karate club organized the inaugural tournament at Hyde Park. Sarah, Peter, Brendan, Rie, and Stephanie competed in both individual Kata and Kumite. For this tournament, the person who got 1st place in the intermediate Kumite division moved up and additionally competed with the advanced competitors. Brendan got 1st place in the intermediate Kumite (green and purple belt division) and climbed up to the intermediate Kumite (brown belt division). After that, he climbed up to the advanced kumite division because of his great job in the brown belt division. Finally, Brendan competed with Black belt competitors in free sparring.
For that tournament, Sarah brought a special Cookie Monster cap with big popped eyes. All participants had to wear this cap and show their goofy face to compete in the tournament. At the after-tournament dinner, Winston-sensei from U-chicago demonstrated "blowing-off candle by the punch", one of the tests for achieving the black belt.
Five people made a trip, Mr. Goetsch, Claus, Sarah, Rie, and Stephanie. For Rie and Stephanie, it was their first tournament after they had joined the club. Sarah, Rie, and Stephanie competed in both Kata and Kumite. Claus competed in Kumite. In all, it was a great experience!
Results
Sarah: 2nd place in both advanced Kata and Kumite
Rie: 2nd place in Kata and 3rd place in One time attacks (Yellow belt division)
Stephanie: 3rd place in Kata and 2nd place in One time attacks (White belt division)
Reports by Rie Watanabe
The 12th annual Collegiate Traditional Japanese Karate Shiai was held in Patten Gymnasium, hosted by NU! Full results can be seen here. Prior to the tournament, Mr. Anthony Milevsky provided all competitors with an energetic group class, and after the tournament, most competitors enjoyed a wonderful dinner at Cozy Noodles in Evanston.
Since the tournament date was moved from February to during NU's spring break, only Sarah and Greg were able to make the trip. There were unusually many competitors in the advanced/black belt division and unusually few lower belts present. Greg was the only white belt at the competition and placed dead last against a 7th kyu competitor in kata and two 7th kyu competitors in kumite. Sarah fared better, placing 2nd in both kata and kumite in very intense and enjoyable matchups.
Sarah, Greg, and the entire contingent from the University of Chicago (Kyrie) made fudge Saturday night. All three of us had a smurfin' good time.
Sarah Waite and Greg Go competed in the black/brown belt division and the white belt division respectively. Sarah earned 2nd place in kata and 1st place in kumite. Greg achieved a 3rd place finish in kata.
Our chief instructor, Claus, served as a judge while Brendan Higgins made the trip, but could not compete due to a recent heel injury.
Our first tournament of the year!
Reports by Gregory Go
We went to Kentucky and Minnesota for two different tournaments this year.
We had a great tournament this year, with about 40 competitors from Purdue, University of Chicago, University of Minnesota, University of Wisconsin and Northwestern University. The Northwestern contingent of Amy Kiley, Laurelle Bordas, Stephane Bordas, Brian Pasquini, Brian Davies, Ken Cadwell, Maelo Maldonado, Josh Pinkston and Angie Guillozet took home 9 medals between them; full results are here.
We streamlined the events this year, which meant that we finished up before 6:00 PM, which should be considered a minor miracle. Afterwards, all the teams went out for pizza together, and had a good time. The University of Minnesota team stayed at Brian's place Friday and Saturday nights, on account of their 6 hour trip. After pizza, a bunch of Northwestern folks came back to Brian's with them, and we crammed 9 people into the den to watch the questionably translated "Kung Fu Colt (?) Master".
Thanks to all who participated, and we hope to see you all next year!
A report from Mr. Luna:
Neither Rain nor snow nor sleet nor freezing cold weather in MN would stop a group from NUKC showing up at the tournament in Minneapolis.
On Saturday a small (but tough :) ) group of NUKC members participated in the annual tournament sponsored by the University of Minnesota Karate club. We had strong showings in Men's intermediate and brown/shodan kumite by Brian Pasquini, Maelo -el malo- Maldonado and Kenneth Cadwel. Maelo and Ken took second and third place in kumite --kudos to them.
Carlos Luna participated in the Nidan and up kumite division (for about 30 seconds) and managed to somehow get thrown out of the tournament. Mr. Luna faced Mr. Ocampo from MN in a very short but highly spirited match. Both Mr. Luna and Mr. Ocampo were disqualified however for not stopping the action after yame. Sources close to Mr. Luna were quoted as saying Mr. Ocampo started it. Mr. Luna was not available for comment...
After the tournament we went to the Mall of America (the biggest mall in the US second only to a mall in Canada).
Everyone in the trip had a good time. I hope they will still invite us to come to MN...
We had a great tournament at the dojo downtown. It started at around 11 and lasted until 2, with 12 people competing in kumite, and a slightly different set of 12 people competing in kata.
Northwestern was represented by Maelo Maldonado, Ken Cadwell and Brian Davies, with Mr. Goetsch judging kumite and competing in kata, and two of our most recent illustrious alumnae, Mr. Bongaarts and Ms. Guillozet, representing the Chicago dojo.
The kumite competition was "modified machine gun". One person stands in front of a post with a line on the floor a couple of feet away, then everyone else takes a turn attacking. As soon as the attacker crosses the line, the bout is on.
The final rankings included two ties:
For the kata tournament, competitors below Shodan did their most advanced kata, while black belts had to do a kata selected by their opponent. Northwestern had an impressive showing, with two members and two alumnae in the top five:
Thanks to all those who came to watch and help keep score!
A small contingent attended the annual Wisconsin tournament on Saturday, October 14. Mr. Goetsch reports:
Chicago sweeps!!! Well almost. Mr. Perez, that wily crafty veteran showed up and took the field in kumite. Using his sweeps he dethroned a number of hopefuls. Following in his footsteps was Mr. Slaughter who captured the second place honors after a sudden death face-off with David Gimberline from Minnesota. Mr. Gimberline however did capture 1st place honors in kata. In Women's matches Northwestern Club alumni Angie Guillozet cleaned up the competition. Repeating last years win in Madison (where as a member of the NU team she took on all comers including a two-time Nationals Champion). Northwestern Club Alumni Paul Bongaarts along with Northwestern Club member Maelo Maldonado who just received his Shodan two weeks ago drew Mr. Perez in the first round. They did however have a chance to face each other in the most exciting match of the day. Paul "aced" out Maelo in a micro-second difference in punches (who really got there first is still an issue of debate).
This year, we attended four tournaments:
A number of us went down to the regional tournament at the dojo downtown. The following club members placed in events:
The NU club attended the 14th annual Minnesota tournament on February 19th, 2000. Tanya Tickel placed 1st in white-orange belt individual kata, Jannette Pinson placed 2nd in green-purple belt women's kumite, and Angie Guillozet placed 3rd in brown-black belt women's kumite.
We also attended the annual Wisconsin tournament in Nov '99. I have no information about placings.
Full information coming soon, I hope
Members of the club attended seminars by Mr. Nishiyama on the kata Tekki Nidan and Tekki Sandan on March 24-26, 2000, and by Mr. Sugiyama on learning to use timing and distance and freesparring on March 30 - April 2, 2000.
We competed in 4 tournaments:
The following members of the NUKC attended:
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We had a lot of fun at the tournament, and saw many of our old friends from the University of Wisconsin-Madison, University of Wisconsin-Green Bay, University of Minnesota, and Purdue. The tournament was a great experience, and allowed us to test ourselves against non-collegiate participants as well as collegiate competitors.
The men's kumite team, consisting of Paul Bongaarts, Josh Pinkston, and Darren Hall (from the University of Iowa, filling in graciously for an injured Ray Wang) took third place in men's team kumite. Angie Guillozet took third place in the Advanced Women's division of Individual Kumite.
Everyone who competed did very well, and we hope that everyone enjoyed the experience.