The AKR 2011 tournament was completed successfully and safely the evening of August 2, 2011.  We had 72 participants (the largest AKR tournament ever!) and were divided into 3 shajo.  We started at 7:00pm,  finished closing Rei by 8:50pm, and exited the Rec Center at 9:03pm, just 3 minutes over our allotted time.  Both because of the strict time limit for the tournament, imposed by the College facility, and because we wanted to allow as many seminar attendees to participate in the tournament as possible, we modified the standard tournament timing to "kai-uchiokoshi" timing.  This meant that everything moved along pretty quickly.  We also eliminated Yawatashi performance, and for tie-breaking, we eliminated the izume in favor of enkin in the interest of time.

 

Most people thououghly enjoyed the tournament experience, and I extend my sincere thanks to the dojo assistants and target judges that kept us on track with the fast tournament timing pace.  A few participants seemed uncomfortable with the quick pace.  To those who found the timing uncomfortable, please practice tournament timing in your home dojo as often as possible.  Try standard tournament timing; also, try kai-uchiokoshi timing.  There are times when the situation of the event demands that we keep to a strict time schedule, and we need to be able to maintain Heijoshin (everyday mind) even under pressure.

 

Congratulations to those that achieved the highest number of hits in the tournament!  The winners were awarded with gift certificates to be spent at the kyudo equipment vendors, Sambu or Takahashi, that were present at the AKR 2011 seminar.

 
Winners from B Group (Nidan and below):
#1 Yukiko Itokawa (7 hits)
#2 Audrey Yang (4 hits, and winner of enkin)
#3 Cesar Ortiz Rojas (4 hits)
 
Winners from A Group (Sandan and above)
#1 Fumiko Takada (5 hits, and winner of enkin)
#2 Eric Ruth (5 hits)
#3 David Boswell (4 hits, and winner of enkin with 2 others with 4 hits)
  
Thank you to everyone for your sincere support for the tournament, especially the dojo assistants (Yoshiko Buchanan sensei, Eric Kong, Miho Oyasu, Rik Center), the target judges (Steve Scott sensei, Daniel Kim, Andrew Platzer, Bill Reid), the MNKR and the AKR.

 

Respectfully submitted,