I wrote the first portion about 48 hours ago on Tuesday. Enjoy!

For lack of a better word, I am alert and almost jittery with anticipation of my Red Sun tomorrow. Years of training essentially come to one half of my black belt test that occurs in about 24 hours. Here is the most current lowdown:

The 3 miles of running will be cut in half. 2 weeks ago while sparing I took a good shot to the shin. Normally this wouldn’t be so bad, however, it was supposed to be non-contact so I wasn’t wearing shin guards. Unfortunately, the hit was between where the bone and the muscle meet. That impact and placement is classic for what my doctor says “a not so good time.” In short, being hit like that caused some muscle fiber tears and tendon pulls. Per our chief instructor, I will be running the first mile and a half, and biking the last mile and a half.

After that it is time for the 500 front kicks. NO FUN. I don’t expect to be able to walk when this is done because my hip flexors suck enough as it is…but perseverance right? Got to do it

At this point I will be begging for the 5 minutes of jumping rope. I’m going to use it as a cool down and for lack of a better word, take my time with it.

Those are the hardest parts of the test, and otherwise I should be okay. Only time will tell, but at least I will know what time says in 25 hours.

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So that was about 48 hours. Ever see the movie Clue? Where between the possible endings they say stuff like, “That is how it could of happened, but here is what really happened!”  This is one of those.

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So starting out the morning with stress with ebay/paypal for the bonehead move of the year, which I didn’t help, my morning started out strenuously. I ate half a bowl of oatmeal at 7am, because it is a power food. Eventually drove over to the gym where my running and biking. I’m thinking I would have to do a total of 3 miles….I WISH. My teacher tells me that I’m going to have to do the running first and take the time from the mile and a half. Then, I have to cycle for that same amount of time. Its fair, but it made me completely change my strategy for what I was going to have to do. Essentially, I decided to run through the shin splints for 1.5 miles no matter what.

The issue with the Red Sun is that the longer your run takes the less time you have to do everything else (DUH). The problem with this is, the more you exhaust yourself during the run the harder everything else was. So knowing this, I decided to tough out the run and do the 1.5 full run instead of the interval sprinting/walking. Time on the mile and a half was 13:47. I probably could have done better had it not been for the splints, but I’m pretty happy for that time. This put the 3 miles at 27:34 after the biking.

After this we drove directly to the Taekwondo school (3.5 miles away). Once there I started directly with the 5 minutes of rope. I forgot the interval skipping/kicking plan. I decided to focus in on each thing individually, but I knew I’d save the front kicks to the end. The rope work wasn’t my favorite thing, and I knew that before I started. I just looked at is as a 5 minute cool down. Just a note, we are told that 15 minute of jumping rope is equivalent to running for one hour. I know for me, after about 3 minutes my calves yell, and at 4 minutes they scream. Now I’m not an overly religious man, but I do admit to praying to finish the task before my calves ripped themselves off the bone…they are still attached.

Next was the push-ups. This went as planned. Once you get used to doing push-ups and keep at that level, doing them when called on isn’t to hard. From there I essentially rolled over (avoiding the puddle of sweat) and went straight to the crunches/sit-ups. This two was not a problem.

I followed it up with the punches and high blocks with weights. I was a little worried about my shoulder at that point, but didn’t feel any pain or strain from it. (From those that don’t know I had a procedure to my shoulder 6 years ago – this procedure stops it from coming out of place, and usually fails by the time you are 30 – so far so good)

Next it was sparring time. This was, for lack of a better word, a good intermission time allowing me to test my muscles out and see how they were going. I made sure to throw all my techniques using as many muscles as possible. I could only feel a little tightness with hip flexors, but I was expecting that

I was ready to do the front kicks at this point, but forgot about the 50 round kicks. I definitely wanted to do that before the front kicks. The 50 of them went pretty well considering the fatigue I was feeling.

This ladies and gentlemen is were we get to our main event. The 500 front kicks. I don’t suggest doing this…I take that back. Do it, and then never do it again. It was for lack of a better word challenging. Each 100 I stopped, stretched my hip flexors for 5-10 seconds on each side and powered through them. IT SUCKED. Unfortunately, I’m going to have to do that and everything else again in the future, for my second degree when I test for that. Thank god there is time until then!!!

So all in all the non-running/biking amount totaled 50:04. Not the fastest red sun at the school (48:40), but definitely in the neighborhood.

Well that is about it. Blackbelt test next Saturday, and I’m sure I’ll post a lot about my nervousness for that and how the rest of my training is going. Later peoples.