The week after Thanksgiving break is one of the biggest challenges for the Texas Taekwondo team members. Missing  four days of practice takes a huge toll on an athlete’s performance and physical shape. Secondly, the ensuing hell week makes it extremely hard to balance school and training. “Hell week” is the time in school when a majority of the professors simultaneously assign papers, projects, and tests for the last week of school. Also, some members have personal obligations as well including work, keeping up with friends and family, or just other individual projects. Maintaining fitness and keeping the body in shape is independent of school work and other areas in life, so Texas Taekwondo keeps a strict practice regimen and the athletes are forced to balance their time between school, training, and other personal obligations.

The past week, our coach, Joe Van, started a goal planning project called “Focus on YOU”. Focus on YOU was a week long goal-setting-idea where one area of weakness was “focused” on. The idea was to find one tangible goal that each individual could personally work on that week to elimnate any kinds of shortcoming each figher may have. The project was successful in that it allowed each athlete to be mindful of Taekwondo throughout their busy schedule this week.

Texas Taekwondo is a goal-oriented club that focuses not only on athletics but also the development in each member’s life at a personal and professional level. The goal setting project of the past week was a testament to the club’s commitment towards personal development as well as preparation for a fight-off that will take place at Texs A&M.

Tomorrow at College Station, Texas Taekwondo will be at A&M to fight matches between other colleges that have a Taekwondo program. Texas A&M, Baylor, and University of Texas are the schools that will be present. With the football team losing to Baylor today, the Taekwondo program will be sure that the glory stolen from them on the football field will be recaptured. In the Taekwondo ring, we will let our presence be known as our athletes will show the struggles that we have overcome as a team and as University of Texas students and  athletes.

Texas Fight!

-Kyung “Kevin” Won