My Son Wins Silver At Singapore's 3rd National Taekwondo poomsae Championships

(Answer to riddle: Rats and horses can’t vomit.)

One year after winning the Gold medal at the 2nd National National Taekwondo Poomsae Championship in 2008 in the Open Yellow 7 category, Ezra was again selected to compete under the Bukit Purmei banner for the B Division Blue 3 (Red tip) category.

Held at Yishun Sports Hall on Sunday June 14, competition standard for this year's Championship was much higher with most competitors scoring high scores of between 6.5 and 7.3 points. Last year's tournament had average scores of about 6.3 to 6.6 points, and such scores had won for the competitors gold medals on most occassions. This year's tournament were mostly evenly contested and the winners were decided by the minutest details during their performances. Such was the level of competition, with most competitors so well prepared to win.

Of course, as parents, we did not want Ezra to shoulder the pressure and just told him to go out there and enjoy himself for he is already a National Champion and it did not matter if he did not win the Gold medal this time around. The main focus was to do his club proud by giving his best performance on the floor mat. Our target score for him was 6.5 points. And his score of 6.833 points, surpassed our expectations and was well into Gold medal territory for this category.

However, the winner was a 9 year old boy, two years older than Ezra. Of all the 1500-plus competitors throughout the day, the boy was the only one who marched onto the floormat, in military style, and bowed to every single one of the four judges and the referee. This was part of his coach's game plan who had sheilded his boy by sticking so closely to him and dishing out instructions after instructions all the way to the competition mat, just to make sure that his protege did not falter during his routine. It was a must-win situation for the coach. It paid off for him, and deservedly so, as his winning score underlined the fact that such details mattered to the judges and he won by the narrowest of margins.

Performance wise, there was nothing to separate between both competitors, and it still could have gone either way, but the added details was the telling difference. Ezra did not lose the Gold medal. The other boy had to work for it. The Bronze medal boy was also not too far off the scores and it just goes to prove that this year's competition standard was much higer.

Ezra was delighted with the silver medal and he said it would not have mattered even if it was bronze, well, if it had came down to that. He was just happy to be selected to compete. Kudos to him for having such spirit of sportsmanship. My wife and I are so proud of him, not so much for winning the silver medal, but more for showing the sportmanship spirit of a Champion.

It was a very tiring day with lots of major delays. His routine was scheduled to begin at 3.10pm but he did not take to the mat until 6pm before he completed his routine at 6.30pm. The medal presentation did not begin till 10.30pm and Ezra received his glittering medal at 11pm.

We got home close to 12 midnight, but it was all worth the trouble. Looking forward to next year, where winning is certainly not the target. Taking part is more fun when there is no pressure.