Judo Tournament = Gold Medal!?!?

Last weekend Mekenna had her first Judo Tournament in Pocatello. It was the kids weekend to be with their mom, but we did not want to miss watching our little girl kick some butt. So we got up nice & early (which I dislike doing especially on the weekend) and got on the road. Mekenna had to be at the gym at 9:00 a.m. to weigh in and then the tournament was suppose to start at 10:00 a.m. but didn't start until 10:30 a.m. Not knowing exactly what to expect at a Judo Tournament we sat there for awhile just trying to figure it all out. I can tell you I figured out the basic rules to it, but not much beyond that. However, we were sitting there watching all this little kids competing and we hear "Will Mekenna Terry's coach please come to the score table". This type of announcement is something we had not heard in the tournament so far. Her coach was informed that there were no girls for Mekenna to compete against. None of the girls her age were in her weight class. So she might have to compete against the boys, but we were informed that was against the rules. Here we sit thinking we drove all the way to Pocatello for nothing and on top of that Mekenna is going to be extremely disappointed to not be able to participate.

After four very long hours later Mekenna got her chance to shine. We were informed that Mekenna won the first round by default. Then for the second round -- I am not sure if the girls were in a higher or lower weight class, but Mekenna had two matches. She was a Judo star! She was aggressive and gave it 100% and won both matches. If you would like to see our Judo star in action watch the videos below. (I tried to keep the camera steady while taping and also trying to watch, so sorry for the amateur bouncy video).

After they finished up the tournament they presented the medals to all the winners. Well once again for some reason we had to wait until the very last of the metal presentation for Mekenna to receive hers. Maybe I should explain myself the tournament was set up for the matches to go from youngest to oldest, but because of our little situation Mekenna was stuck at the end after all the older kids. Making her and us wait a long, long time; so when they started handing out the medals and started with the youngest I thought hey she will be toward the first. Boy was I wrong, once again she was last! Not only that they gave her the gold medal only to change their mind and take it from her. At this point I was about to go ballistic I had had enough of this chaos. How does our little girl win all of her matches and then take silver? Anyhow before I total embarrassed myself and did a little Judo on someone myself they put Mekenna back up on the podium with a gold metal. The brief explanation that I could hear is Mekenna and the other girl tied in points. I guess part of the rules that I could not make sense of after sitting in that gym for the last 4 1/2 hours.

What an experience!!! We are extremely proud of Mekenna and all of her hard work.