SIX O'CLOCK

No need to wear a watch when Francesca is around.

THE WORLD BOWS TO YOU

Do yourself a favor. Watch her. Watch her as she performs Koryo. Because if you don't see her, you could never believe it. This small girl is the absolute pinnacle of TKD Poomsae. Su-Ji Kang is the name. You know, here in the West we are used to considering Korean Poomsae players as aliens. But she... she is something aliens would certainly be admired of. And yet she's human, as there is one moment in every World Championship when she gently trembles on a single stance, like she was telling us she's neither magic or extraterrestrial, only stellar.
Whereas Korean athletes doing the splits while kicking are not new to us, she impresses in both speed and verticality. She actually moves faster than your eyeballs; when you realize she's kicking, she's already using one foot like a visor, while holding her legs at right angles to the ground.
A few months ago, the Olympic Games celebrated some real giants as the best fighters in the world. This early December, the aesthetic branch of our discipline crowned this cute girl as its unparalleled Empress. Then tiny Su-Ji prostrated herself on the mat in a prayer of thanks, thus looking even smaller in the moment she was proclaimed the greatest among the greatest for the third time in a row. This is what real champions are made of.

(Pre-editing photos: mastaekwondo.com, Rowdy Leedeman, Nico Randriam)

WHAT'S YOUR GRADE AGAIN?

How do you feel with your belt? Do you think it mirrors your effective skill? As Taekwondo Olympic call grows louder, students no longer feel grades as critical goals. Most of them deliberately give up on acquiring superior dans to avoid learning complicated poomsae, which would subtract time to combat training. However, nowadays black belt exams are not selective. They're expensive. But there is little point in spending time and money for grades easily achieved by poor martialists as well. A few weeks ago, I took my 4th dan exam. It costed me 200 euros, travel expenses aside. I was happy to undergo a test unlike my frequent poomsae competitions, even though I was strongly debilitated by a five months stop. The excitement for the unusual trial, however, couldn't prevent me from questioning the meaning of what I was doing. Did I want to take a further step in my TKD career? Did I want to acquire the grade that would allow me to perform Pyongwon at the Italian Poomsae Championship this December? Did I want to have my two decades experience in this sport attested on the basis of a public showcase? Maybe the three of them, but the one thing I am always looking for at an official TKD event is truth. And as long as failing an exam will be a remote possibility, I will find it hard to give much importance to those little stripes on the right end of my belt. 200 euros drain excepted.

KICK OF THE NORTH STAR

Number one athletes are often handsome people. Cristiano Ronaldo, David Beckham, Kakà. I am getting more and more convinced that there is a fil rouge connecting beauty and talent in sport. And when it comes to aesthetic sports like diving, figure skating, gymnastics, and - of course - taekwondo Poomsae, sometimes I am driven to think that beauty provides an unbeatable, untrainable added value to the presentation score. This can be the case of Roosa Närhi, Finland Senior 1 Champion. Now look at her yopchagi. A very high kick is not always a beautiful kick. Back, hips and legs can get overturned to bring the foot higher, thus compensating some limitations on the flexibility side. Roosa's sidekick instead has the triumphal shape of an equestrian statue. Her front leg leads the charge pointing up and forward, her kicking foot is perfectly parallel to the ground, and her stern refulgent expression adds the solemn charm of an ice Amazon. Gorgeous.

(Photos courtesy of Aleksandar Golović)

WILD WILD ELIF

One personality that really couldn't go unnoticed at Genova 2011 is the junior European champion Elif Yilmaz, from Turkey. She's got everything she needs: cold blood, incredible high kicks, and the proud killer look you could expect from a warrior princess. What you couldn't expect, though, is how Elif's vibrant personality is constantly drawing attention even when she's not busy on the tatami. The first time I saw her was on the stands, during her father's competition. Elif was standing in front of the first row of seats in order to take photos. When some people kindly asked her to get out of their sights, she put on one of the scariest faces I've ever seen, thus silencing her unwanted interlocutors. A few moments later, when the first score appeared on the screens, she ran away crying with joy, without even waiting for her father's final exercise, which would actually crown Mustafa Yilmaz European Master 1 champion. The next day, she had just secured her gold medal with a flawless performance when I met her again on the stands, having a conversation with a couple of guys from another national team. <<Really? Am I first?>>. She was dominating the competition and she didn't even know!! Apart from her glorious smile on the podium, the last memory of her I retain is Elif having a souvenir T-shirt signed by all her foreign athlete friends... while she was wearing it. Irresistible Elif.

(Photos courtesy of Aleksandar Golović)