Built By Martial Arts Championship

Today was the big day of the tournament, Maddie's first competition!  We had made the journey down here to Grovetown yesterday, and so the drive here this morning wasn't too long.  We had our breakfast first at the hotel, and it was actually pretty good.  After that, we quickly checked out and were on our way over to the center where the competition was located!

It was such a full day.  Maddie and her friends were there the entire day, and she had the greatest time.  I was taking pictures of the group from Oakwood the best I could, snapping photos and documenting things here or there.  What follows are a lot of pictures.

So early on, there was a nice ceremony introducing everyone to the different level belt holders, all the way to the ninth degree.  The grand master is GK Lee, who you can see above.

One of the earliest things was a testing session for a group of students wanting to advance to a new belt.  Our friend Reina was in this category, and so I was happy to take a bunch of pictures for her testing.

Afterwards, what an honor to be personally instructed by the grand master himself.  Pretty cool moment.

So after the testings, and by the way Reina did just fine, there was a big introduction of all the students here, a sort of opening ceremony for the event.  Each were introduced by belt rank, and you can see Maddie there in the midst of the crowd.

For the most of the day, Maddie and her friends spent their time judging other contests, and learning how to score contestants.  You can see her friend Kaylee above, and below Master Edge is watching over some younger competitors.

Ah, Maddie is here with two other judges, watching and making her judgment for several contests this morning.

I was taking photos of some other students as well this morning.  A lot of Edge Martial Arts students did very well throughout the day here.

And so it was time for Maddie's competition.  There's her name above.  She was ready.  Last night she was practicing in the hotel room and throughout the day she was getting the hang of what judges look for.  She was getting ready to compete for the first time ever.  Meanwhile, other students from Edge were competing too.  Mom and I got seats up front for Maddie's routine, and watched other students as Maddie prepared.

Kaylee came over to give her an encouraging hug.  It was a super nice moment.

And there she goes.  Maddie told us that according to others, nobody wants to go first.  Still, she was chosen to go first, and so she calmly walked up and started her routine.  It was spectacular.

At the end of it, she got a big score - real big.  She was so happy with that, and though we don't know much about the scoring, we were happy to see that it was really good.  We didn't realize how good it was until later on though.  Maddie had several other competitors to go after her round, so we just had to wait and see.  Meanwhile, next door another student was doing her routine.

Oh, and here's Kaylee.  She wound up coming home with a medal too, and we were super glad to hear that.

Next to us, Mila was nailing her routine in awesome fashion.  She's accustomed to tournaments now, and does really well at them.  She got herself some medals too.

And so the end of our wait came, and all the girls had done their routines in our area.  At the end, it turns out that Maddie had gotten a tie for second place with another student.  She medaled!  But it wasn't over with yet - it turns out she had to repeat her routine again, along with the other girl.  Both were competing for second place.  So Maddie got up there and she did her routine one more time. 

This time, she did even better.  She won the contest, and got second place!

And there it is.  How awesome is that?  Maddie got a medal on her first outing.  She was really happy to have that one to take home.

There were still other competitions to go.  Maddie was also involved in the traditional weapons competition.  Her friend Kaylee went first, and did a dazzling routine with a fan, which was super cool.

Then Maddie went next with her bo staff routine.  

It was really solid!  She was so good today, so focused and talented.  This time around, she didn't medal - she got fourth - but she did so well, and was so confident out there.  I think she'll want to try more of these tournaments!

Meanwhile, other Edge students were competing.  Sparring was going on, and you can see above one of our students, and below there is Chris, also competing.  He won this one!

It was a huge, huge day.  So much fun for Maddie!  

We left there soon after this, a little early but then again we'd been there since 8am.  We dropped by Chick-Fil-A to get some food, and then started our long trek home.  We dropped by a grocery store in Jefferson to get some corn beef for St. Patrick's Day, and then continued home without much incident.  We knew the looming weather forecast - big scary storms were coming.  They caused so much hurt and devastation in Alabama and Mississippi earlier today.  We got home before the storms and I stayed up to watch the forecasts and alerts, but things seemed to be weakening.  They were still loud and strong storms, but at least the wind wasn't as powerful.  

Mom and Maddie had a good night's rest, and I'll catch up tomorrow.  It was a really fun day though!