After a connecting flight from London to Portugal, a crazy ride in a Avis Taxi and a redition of "Empire State of Mind" from Zachary, a very hyper ZSNI arrive at Axis Hotels Porta de Vassim, Portugal at 12.00am!!
First stop food as Zachary is always starving, 24/7.
Thursday 21st November
This is the only day ZSNI have off to relax and enjoy Portugal before the events start.
The day starts with a walk around town after Sensei Terry steals Yasmin's coffee, things are not going well in the resturant when Sensei Terry finds a piece of plastic in his meal and is trying to shout at the waiter using his dodgey forgein language impressionations. After that it is off to the local supermarket to stock up on essentials! Athlete essentials are as follows:
- Coffee
- Hairspray
- Deodrant
- Chocolate Milk
Zachary is even worse at tennis than he is at kata.
Training commences at 7.30pm - Since ZSNI is a small enough team, booking the big training hall is not practicle, therefore, we wait until everyone is gone and head to the top floor of the hotel and use the pre laid matts out. We always land on our feet in life!
Drills after drills after drills.
Once this is over, Zachary is on tomorrow so the preparation starts. Zachary heads to the bath to relax.
Friday 22nd November
Tournament offically starts at 2pm - with Zachary having gone into hibernation and not speaking to anyone for 2 hours prior to the compeititon it is all plain sailing, walking to the arena after a nice breakfast and being re-united with all the teams we seen at WSKA.
Kata first and Zachary is off to a good start having warmed up well in the preparation room.
Kumite is next and a tired Zachary is pumped and ready to go.
Having preformed to the best of his on day ability, the pressure of the day causes Z to fall at the first hurdle, although our side tells a different side to the refeeres desicion on points. Like always. Zachary is in good spirits afterwards and there is always next year. Train longer and harder now.
After the compeititon, Andrew is preparing for his category the next day. Andrew heads to the bath.
Saturday 23rd November
9am start, although Yasmin is up early to prepare the lads for the compeititon. Whilst running 10 minutes behind, team ZSNI needs to get a move on. But as always on the way to the compeititon, a mini van pulls up and offers ZSNI a lift - We always land on our feet!
Andrew is fully in the zone, with a tough matt he is preparing for kata while Y and Z watch from the sidelines.
Put out in the first round of kata, but not bothered Andrew moves on to his favourite target of the day. Kumite. With Sensei Terry on side pumping and blasting Andrew, his exciting time comes.
1st Round - Done
2nd Round - Done
The refeeres round up the competitiors to annouce those through to the final and Yasmin nearly collapses in the stands thinking that Andrew is the the European Finale. However, the refeeres made a mistake and the compeititors are asked to line up accordingly again for Russia and Northern Ireland to fight for a first place in the final.
The Russian (who had been ipponing opponents throughout the day) was the same height and build as Andrew and it was a tough fight with Andrew and the Russian fighting well and not letting either one dominate the matt. With time called after 2 minutes Andrew had lost this fight by half a point. He did his teammates and coach very proud on the day, this is the second time that such a thing has happened to Andrew in the quater finals. Dispite the shape of his face and karate suit afterwards he seemed to enjoy himself. Because of this great achievement Sensei Terry buys Andrew a brand new tournament Karate Suit.
After the compeititon, it is Yasmin's time to prepare, but she lets Andrew have a bath first as he is grumpy, tired and she just wants him out of the way.
Anyone who has been to a international championship will understand my feelings towards the opening cermoney. So I am not going to dwell on the fact that I dislike it so much. It would be such a boring paragraph.
Sunday 24th November
Again walking to the arena, Yasmin in total silence and Andrew dropping a banana all over the place, the mini van pulls along side of us and we are on route to the stadium. Having seen the draw on Wednesday, it is confusing why KUGB NI has been placed against KUGB ENGLAND. But Yasmin is up first in Kata against friend Holly Stirling from England, well we can all guess how that turned out, but ill get my kata sorted someday, I swear.
Next, having prepared fully in the warm up room with Zachary and Andrew by her side, Yasmin heads to the matt. She can see Sensei Brennan talking to her opponent as he is her coach.
Unfortunatly things don't go to Yasmins plan and she is defeated in a flag decision at full time. She is not very happy about this as she was looking forward to getting a new karate suit also :(.
Andrew is on in the Senior Mens Category against KUGB ENGLANDS top compeitior Joe Rawcliff, with a worthy fight and experience learnt, our ESKA 2013 Golden boy is defeated also.
With Sunday night upon us and we are just notified by sidekick Louise that we are up at 3am to catch our flight to London and then a 6 hour wait in London Airport until our flight back to Derry. ZSNI make the good decision to head to bed.
ESKA is a learning curve for the young and a pedastol for the old.
Through success first comes defeat and with constant training it will pay off.
You are only as good as the people around you and ESKA is where the best live and we are proud to be apart of it.
We are still the ippon champs.
SWITZERLAND 2014.
Yasmin Geddis
3rd Dan
Ps. we nearly killed eachother in the airport, Sensei Terry slept most of the time and sidekick Louise wore headphones for the first time.
Disclaimer: This post is the diary entry through my (Yasmin Geddis) eyes only and does not reflect the views of Sensei Terry, Zachary Geddis, Andrew Mills or Sidekick Louise.
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