KICKgen member, Jackson Rudolph wins Gold!

Jackson Rudolp, a KICKgen member since May 2008(Jacksonr) recently competed at the 2008 WKA World Championships. Jackson’s journey to the 2008 WKA World Championships began over a year ago when he attended a regional WKA tournament. The USA team tryouts had been about a month prior to this tournament and several of the parents of team members approached Jackson’s parents and told them that he should try out for the 2008 team. As Jackson focused on his training and traveled the NASKA circuit he used the tryouts as one of his motivations to work even harder, and in June of 2008 his sweat was rewarded with a spot on Team USA!



As a team member of the Premier Martial Arts National Karate Team Jackson had faced stiff competition against some of the top junior competitors in the country, but this would be his first time to face international competition on this level. He knew he had to make it through an elimination round to get to the finals to have a chance to compete for a gold medal and his first world championship. He studied the WKA rules and adjusted his forms to fit them and after a lot of intense training, he was ready to leave for Orlando, Florida where the U. S. hosted this year’s championships.

On Sunday, November 9, the World Championships were kicked off with a grand opening ceremony at Disney’s Wide World of Sports. After several opening speeches and the introduction of the new WKA president, Klaus Nonnemacher of Germany, Team USA took the field and formed a human tunnel and greeted competitors from 24 countries. After all the teams had filed in and were seated, they were treated to a performance by Sideswipe. It was a great experience for Jackson to see all of these martial artists from places like Switzerland, England, Brazil, and Ireland. Boys and girls that live half way around the world speak a different language, yet have much the same dream as he, TO WIN A WORLD CHAMPIONSHIP!

Monday and Tuesday brought the elimination rounds. The competitors were all very serious and competition was intense, only the top four would make it on to the finals. You could see on their faces when there was a drop or a misstep the agony of knowing they would not go through to the final round. After 9 ½ hours of competition, Jackson was a finalist in four divisions and would be competing for medals at the finals to be held at the end of the week.

After taking much of Wednesday to rest and practice, Jackson woke up Thursday morning calm and ready to go. He would have three finals on this day, the first of which was Hard Style Forms. Jackson ran a strong form and was awarded the bronze medal for his effort. Next up was Weapons without music. Jackson ran a strictly traditional bo form that showed great power and technique. Most of his competitors ran a more creative form, but in this case traditional strikes won out over spins and Jackson won gold! The medal stand ceremony was very emotional for his parents and grandparents when they heard his name followed by the words “gold medalist and world champion!” His last event of the day was freestyle form with music and Jackson held on with strong karate technique against flips and extreme moves to take home silver in that division!

Friday brought Jackson’s final event of the week, weapons with music, and it would prove to be the most dramatic finish of them all! Of the four finalists, Jackson went first and came out strong and looked great. The other three competitors were all Canadian, and two were the gold and silver medalist from last year’s event. Jackson knew it was close, but …imagine his surprise when they announced a three way tie between him and last year’s medal winners. The only way to break the tie was to have the three boys run the forms again. Jackson was under tremendous pressure but was able to come back out and run the form with great intensity, when he finished the crowd erupted with cheers. Even the judges were smiling when they awarded Jackson with gold! After the medal stand ceremony, someone asked Jackson how it felt to be a two time world champion; he just shrugged and said he felt pretty much the same as before he was a world champion!

With the competition over Jackson was able to spend a little time talking to some of the other competitors, which proved to be a little challenging since most spoke very little English. He was introduced to girl from Italy by her coach and took pictures with some of the competitors from England and Canada and made plans to catch up with some of the Canadians at some of the NASKA events next year.

Jackson pretty much summed up his feelings on competition a few weeks ago when in preparation for leaving for the World Championships; he was interviewed by a local sports reporter who asked him why he competes. He said “It’s not for the trophies or the medals - it’s because of how I feel when I am in the ring competing.” Keep eye on this ten year old. We more gold in his future!

Are you wondering how to get your competition results written about here? It is easy, just email us Kickgen@kicken.com and share your results, and include pictures and videos.

This just in....

This past weekend, Julie Drapkin (Beast from the East)competed at the MAF2008,in the Jr. Black Belt division for Kung Fu in forms and weapons and won gold in both. Check out her youtube video.



By the way, ever wonder why you see competitor's results here? It is simple, they send us their tournament results, pictures and videos and we gladly share them. Wanna know how to get your tournament results added? It is easy, email us at competitors@kickgen.com. We love to hear and share your experiences!

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Community Upgrade!

Hello members,

KICKgen just celebrated our first birthday on October 6th. We have experienced incredible growth in such a short time, and are now getting ready to make another big enhancement to the community. In fact, we’re going to upgrade our internet platform so that we can offer you many more cool features. You will love the fun enhancements we have in store for you! Stay tuned – we will be sharing sneak peaks along the way. A final upgrade will be completed in January.

Also, the link for purchasing a 2009 Rising Stars Calendar is coming in the next few days.

Thanks, the KICKgen Team: Austin, Lauren, Mike, Siham, Tracy and David.