I stood in my corner, gently moving my weight from one ball of my foot to another and confidently banging my 10oz Top Ten Boxing gloves together whilst biting hard on my gum shield.

I remember watching Rocky Balboa doing the same in Rocky III when he fought the Russian Ivan Drago, somewhat naively I thought copying this pre-fight move moments before the referee called me into the centre of the ring would somehow calm me down. It didn’t, I remained as nervous as hell. The referee beckoned us forward. At that moment I noticed that the Emergency Ambulance was parked outside and hoped the Paramedic hadn’t disappeared for a siesta in case he needed to carry me off to the local hospital. I took my first step forward to the centre when I heard Sensei Raf, in my corner, shout “Stephanie!” (he maintains a creative imagination for nick names in times of crisis), I turned immediately around to be met with a ferocious slap across the face nearly knocking out my gum shield. “Now you’ve been hit, there’s nothing to fear”, he barked “NOW GET IN THERE AND DO IT!” Christ, I thought, if my opponent doesn’t knock me out, Sensei Raf sure as Hell will..........

I had been practising Kick boxing for 10 years, achieving my Black Belt 1st Dan after 5 and 2nd Dan after a further three. The last two had been great but I felt as thought I had plateau’d and that breaking through this glass ceiling of mediocrity was about to change without any prior warning nor much choice. It had been announced that a number of Instructors from the club were participating in a Full Contact competition in Barcelona in the beginning of June, and I had been itching to join the party to travel out there. Not to fight of course, rather to enjoy the banter, participate in the camaraderie and of course sample the outstanding Tapas Barcelona had to offer. When I mentioned my culinary pilgrimage to Sensei Raf, our conversation adopted a real Helter Skelter twist;

Me: “Sensei Raf, I’ve heard about the competition coming up in June, I was wondering if I would be able to tag along, you know I......”

Sensei Raf: “I think that would be a great idea – after 10 years it’s about time you did a competition”

Me: “But....”

Sensei Raf: “Training starts next Tuesday”

Me: “But....”

Sensei Raf: “You’ll need to train with the guys at least four times a week and then on your own for another two”

Me: ”But....”

Sensei Raf:” You’ll also need to drop some weight, you’ll find the sparring hard if you’re carrying too much. We’ve got six weeks, plenty of time to get ready.”

Me: “But....”

Sensei Raf: “Good – I’m glad we’ve agreed that then. See you next Tuesday. Be prepared for hard work”.

Me: “But....”

It was now too late as Sensei Raf had brought the discussion to an assertive close with an about turn and headed back into the office at Karmaa. I was left sat in the dojo like a poor impersonator of Rodin’s Thinker Statue trying to work out how exactly I had found myself in this seemingly unwelcome position.

I’ve often wondered what the type of training is involved when you get ready for a competition. Do you work flat out for the full 6 weeks? Is 6 weeks really sufficient time to get from a very “ok” standard to competition fit? What type of training would be involved and would the real life 37 year “Kung fu Panda” carrying a few too many love handles really be able to withstand a few rounds in the ring. All these questions and many more swirled around my head and for the next 6 weeks this is all I thought about every moment of my day and every nightmare when I slept.

The first thing to say is how remarkable the human body & mind is when we really focus our minds on achieving a goal. The first couple of weeks of training with the team was very intense and was mainly focused on pure cardio with bouts of heavy sparring thrown in too. After the first week I didn’t think my body was able to take the intensity of work I was subjecting it to; beautiful deep purple bruises began to appear with increasing alacrity on my body.  I would start the training sessions feeling sore and already tired but somehow after a brief warm up and stretch it seemed to accept the punishment that was about to follow and the aches would then disappear.

After the end of the second week of training I seriously had doubts in my own ability to continue as how tired I was beginning to feel. I had also dramatically altered my diet cutting out all sugars, carbs in the evening and any fried food. All I seemed to consume for breakfast was porridge and then grilled protein with salad or vegetables for lunch & dinner. The weight began dropping immediately but it’s the nearest to “cold turkey” that I had ever experienced.

Whenever I went to whinge to Sensei Raf either about my aches and pains of my lack of ability to compete successfully he would respond with two simple sentences, for a bout of doubt it was “Just turn up” or for a whinge a simple “I don’t care”. Such was the frequency of my complaints that after a short while he would simply hold up three fingers on each hand representing either sentence. Often we would have a virtual conversation with me complaining and him simply alternating a three finger response with either hand. From a distance I’m sure it looked like we were practising sign.

I often wondered if during weeks 4 & 5 when we really focused on the technical aspects of sparring if we were to shown some real special moves that had been kept in a secret cupboard but in truth we simply focused on our basics and perfecting them. “Get the basics right and the rest will follow” was Sensei Raf’s mantra and sure enough it was the simple beauty of fine tuning these basic moves that lead I believe to the confidence of all us competing really picking up.

It began very slowly to show through in the quality of all our sparring that by perfecting our basic techniques how much better we got. The pain, aches, sores, doubts of frustration were still there but somehow they began to subdue as when sparring I noticed that I was that fraction better, slightly faster and able to complete 7 rounds without immediately gagging for an oxygen mask at the end of the sparring. These almost imperceptible improvements gave my confidence levels an enormous boost.
By the time we got to week 6 the intensity our training subdued as we had all reached a fantastic state of physical fitness and our sparring techniques were as sharp as ever. Looking back, I had often thought of Sensei Raf as our equivalent of Sgt Emil Foley in the film “An Officer and a Gentleman” (“You ain’t good enough to be a Kick boxer” – “Yes, I am!”). There were times when he goaded us to try harder, practice a technique for the umpteenth occasion when we were all tired and adopt a seemingly completely uncompromising attitude in getting a particular technique completely right - all of this seemed too severe but reflecting back, breaking through this pain barrier was in the end was more a mental than physical challenge. It was this philosophy of uncompromising perfection of the fundamentals that gave us the “warrior” mentality we (especially me) all needed.

The fight went it came passed off quickly. Anthony had fought a really tough fight and had won and I was next in the ring. “Was I nervous?” Unbelievably so, but there was a remarkable calm that came over me moments before the referee brought us together. When I looked at my opponent I knew that he was as petrified as me but somehow I also knew I had received the very best training possible, that my stamina was as good as it had ever been and that somewhat paradoxically the strength of us all as individual fighters was borne as much out of our invincible spirit as a united fighting team representing our club as it was our individual ability to kick and punch. This team spirit is I believe the rocket fuel that ignites the fighting spirit. People often ask what did you hit him with? The truth is that I can’t really remember other than I know I hit him far more than he did me. After the fight Sensei Anthony pointed to a healthy large blood stain on my white top – for once it wasn’t mine.

Moments later the referee held up my hand as a winner but honestly, the victory was owed as much to Sensei Raf and all the students and Instructors who had helped us with our training in the six weeks prior as it did to my ability to outmanoeuvre my opponent. The sense of winning is creates an opium of good feeling that I think is difficult to replicate in anything else and I think that Sensei Daniel, Sensei Andrei and Sensei Anthony would all agree with this sentiment. For my part and together with Sensei Nick for that brief moment in time we were all a union of winning Musketeers.

For any Student, male or female, who thinks that they would like to participate in a competition I would urge you to do so as it will be a real life enhancing experience and take you on an incredible journey.