This past week we traveled to Greenville South Carolina for the US National Karate Do Federation Championships. Most people don't know but in order to compete you have to qualify at the previous tournaments like Vegas and Ohio. Ricardo and 8 of his students from the competition team competed on Thursday, Friday, and Saturday. We started off on Thursday with Ricardo competing and it was super intense. He has been training so hard for months and
all of us wanted him to win. Unfortunately, he did not make the US team. He was so disappointed but was uplifted by a lot of positive comments from the US coach including him blatantly telling him he was the best and should have won but he was glad he didn't beat his students. HAHA. It was pretty much a reaffirmation of his hard work. He has 2 more years to go to try out and win so we're going to start working hard on making it to Texas next year. But, the week did get better when one of his students won first place...a National Champion! This is a huge deal. This could lead to the Pan Am Games and potentially a place on the Olympic team someday if the student (who is a girl...woop woop) keeps working hard. He also had 3 second place or silvers and 1 third place, bronze winner. A big deal considering he only took 8 kids and got 5 medals.
The rest of the week was spent at the pool, the zoo, and with all of us parents bellied up the bar at 5:30 everyday for FREE drinks and snacks. Yes FREE! The hotel we stayed at was awesome - Embassy Suites Conference Center and Golf Resort. Definitely recommend that one for next time. Anyway, Ricardo had practice each evening at 5 and all of the parents, me included, were trying to get him to practice for 2 hours because free drinks were served for 2 hours. LOL! Yes, Alexander went to Karate practice. OF COURSE!
I can't say how much fun we had spending time together and with the team. I think all of us parents had as much fun as the kids. Wednesday night we all headed to Red Robin for dinner...table for 25 please. But the best unplanned event was Friday night when we all went to downtown Greenville for dinner. It started to pour down rain and we kept walking in it, just laughing the entire time. Alexander was with his best friend Zane so he was good to go and we finally found a restaurant that had a guy playing a guitar. It was super awesome. We all shared some yummy food and great conversation and most importantly a lot of laughter which is something everyone needs. I honestly can't wait to do it again very soon!
I have more pics but they're on Cha Chi's camera so those will have to wait. But, this is a video of Alexander performing on the plaza outside of the Hyatt downtown yesterday. We had been playing in the water waiting on Ricardo so he was barefoot and loving it. He just had to start doing his Karate. He was so in to it that I had to tape it. This was the second form he was doing. It is amazing how much he tries to imitate Ricardo and the kids and with such concentration. You know, Ricardo just hates that! hehe
