This weekend we went to Whidbey Island (our first visit there) for Davey’s first taekwando tournament.

Davey was a little nervous about it but he was excited too.

I think he’s laughing at Master Hughes (his teacher) in this picture.  He always makes Davey laugh.

David gave him some words of encouragement before things got started.  The older boy standing behind him always looks out for Davey and helps make sure he is where he is supposed to be.

They got all lined up, and then a group of black belts (and a few other up and coming students) kicked (literally!) things off by doing a great taekwando demonstration.  There was lots of kicking, flipping around, and breaking of boards.  Davey loved it (we all did!).

Davey had to wait awhile for his turn to do his form.  He passed the time chatting with his good friend Eva.

I think they were comparing patches here.

Finally it was time.  He’s looking a little nervous.  I didn’t realize that he was going to have to his form alone in front of 5 black belt judges!  They were really nice but doing it for the first time was tough.

He did well.  He had a mistake at the end which caused him to finish a little off, but overall he did great for his very first tournament.  We were just really proud of him for pushing through it.

He was a little disappointed in his performance.  He’s not thrilled with his medal.  He had thought that everyone got a medal, and they did.  But – they also ranked the top 3 places, and he didn’t like not being in the top 3.

He was very polite though and just did awesome working through a new experience.

He even made some new friends.

I asked Davey what he thought about it all.  He told me, “I didn’t expect to get a 4 medal.  Maybe 3 or 2, but not 4!”  So that was disappointing for him.  It was his first experience ever of competing in that way for a rank.  He’s ready though to do the next tournament, and David will participate in the next one with him as well.  It will be easier next time since we will know what to expect!

I am sure proud of our little 7 year old who wants to be a grandmaster one day.  He also wants to run a taekwando studio with David.  (Plus be an oceanographer!)