See also: A combat sport (Quicktime, 1 min 49 sec)
Paul Pfotenhauer, producer; Ken Zukin, videographer
League champions show their grit to go for the gold
Tae kwon do, the Korean art of kicking and punching, is a combat sport. That means winning, losing — and pain.
Freshman Aaron Skilken, a technocultural studies major from Los Gatos, can relate. Since he started the sport 11 years ago, Skilken has walked away from only two tournaments without a limp.
“You have to toughen up mentally and continue your fight, because if your opponent sees that one leg is hurt, they will exploit your inability to use that leg,” says Skilken, who won a bronze medal his last year in high school at the USA Tae Kwon Do Senior Nationals event.
Skilken is a member of the Tae Kwon Do Sport Club at UC Davis, which earlier this month clinched the championship of the Pac-West Taekwondo Conference for 2007-2008.
UC Davis is now one of seven California schools that make up the four-year-old Pac-West Taekwondo Conference. The others are: California State University, East Bay; Stanford University; University of California, Berkeley; UCLA; University of Southern California; and the University of California, San Diego.
A credit to the students
"The success of the Tae Kwon Do Sport Club team is a credit to the students' hard work, tremendous dedication and exceptional student leadership," said John Campbell, director of the Department of Campus Recreation, which manages the sport club program.
"The Tae Kwon Do Sport Club team exemplifies the objectives of Campus Recreation sport club program."
More than 1,400 UC Davis students participate in the sport club program, which is composed of 36 sports, with men's and women's teams. Each sport club is managed and run by the participants themselves. Sport club participants not only enjoy the rewards of athletic competition, but they also gain skills in collaboration, leadership, problem-solving, and financial management.
Tae kwon do club president Tal Sraboyants was born in Russia and emigrated to Sacramento in 2000. The UC Davis sophomore had no prior martial arts experience, but was encouraged by his father to participate in the tae kwon do club. “Being a part of a team allows you to see things and experience things that you wouldn’t see otherwise. Traveling with the team has taught me time management and has broadened my horizons.”
Thanks in part to his experience with tae kwon do, Sraboyants is considering a career as a physical therapist. “You learn so much about the human body and its capabilities when you watch a match. Being on the UC Davis club team has given me first-hand experience with physical therapy, since tae kwon do is such a physically strenuous sport."
A variety of ways to get involved
Students can get involved in tae kwon do through classes in physical education, the elite team, competitive and recreational practice at all levels, and the instructional club. (The club is also open to staff and faculty, as are the Experimental College martial arts classes.)
The UC Davis tae kwon do club has been coached by Alex Antipa since 1988. Antipa, who also instructs martial-arts courses for the Department of Exercise Science, has been a senior television engineer at Academic Technology Services (formerly MediaWorks) for more than 25 years.
When he became the club’s head instructor, Antipa threw himself into expanding opportunities for students. In 1991, he received approval for the first martial arts curriculum in physical education, beginning with a course in self-defense.
Antipa believes that some UC Davis students could achieve Olympic success.
“It would be my long-term goal that UC Davis brings home Olympic gold before I retire — that's only two Olympic cycles,” Antipa says. If he is still having fun, though, Antipa jokes that he might stick around for a third cycle.
Expectations of national gold
This spring, six students from UC Davis will compete at the qualifying tournament, with the expectation that more than one will qualify for the USA Tae Kwon Do Senior Nationals in Detroit in July. While not a collegiate competition, Detroit is a prelude to joining a number of international competitions other than this summer’s Olympics, which already has a tae kwon do team in place.
‘If you want to get really fit and be able to do kicks and punches, you have to push yourself.’
Angelo Acebedo
Since it was introduced on campus more than 30 years ago, Antipa says tae kwon do has grown into the largest martial arts sport at UC Davis. Today, UC Davis offers two sections of self-defense, two for tae kwon do, one of hapkido, another Korean martial art form, and one for tai chi.
Tai chi, a “soft-style” Chinese martial art that focuses on health and emphasizes balance and fluidity, will be taught by “Janna” Peng-An Graves. She won a gold medal in the sport in 1984 at the Wushu World Championships.
Antipa notes that tae kwon do attracts people who like challenges. Imagine standing shoulder to the wall with your leg raised high into a kick position for five minutes.
Hurt?
“No, it was really fun,” says Angelo Acebedo, a junior in mechanical and aeronautical engineering from San Francisco who, admittedly, likes to push himself.
Just to get into shape
“Our tae kwon do coach really works you out,” he says. “I took that class just to get into shape.
“If you want to get really fit and be able to do kicks and punches, you have to push yourself.”
Acebedo also highly recommends eating breakfast before workouts, a habit he learned the hard way after practicing so vigorously he felt faint.
To transition from being a beginner like Acebedo to a high-level competitor like Skilken takes serious dedication, Antipa points out.
“It takes long years of training and going to events, and what tae kwon do calls ‘indomitable spirit.’ ”
Freshman athlete Skilken says he focuses his energy on that tae kwon do psychology.
“My first coach always taught me that ‘tae kwon do is 90 percent mental and 10 percent physical,’ ” he says. “In the ring, you have to be mentally strong and confident, or you will not be able to win.”