Tag Archives: sports

Much like his parents, Nyan has never shown much athletic ability, nor much interest. And that’s fine! We’re perfectly okay with that, although we’ll keep him in soccer a while longer for the exercise and teamwork aspects, and will continue to encourage him to get exercise, to swim, to run. Healthy habits start early. We’re also keeping him in taekwondo, and he’s really starting to show some results.

In early November, there was another grading exercise – that’s where hundreds of taekwondo students from across the island converge on a studio in central Singapore to show off their moves and, if they do them right, advance to the next level. So early one Sunday morning, off we went. In the car:

Here’s our martial artist, practicing his moves before going into the actual grading room.

So did he pass? He did. Here’s his instructor, Mr Lee, giving Nyan his next belt – yellow-tip. Look how proud Nyan is and how he’s trying to hard to be serious and not smile!

And finally, showing off his moves.

Next up: a full yellow belt.

After Nyan’s Saturday soccer club played matches against (and got walloped by) some older, more experienced kids, his coaches decided to devote one session to learning some goalie techniques. Fine with Nyan, as he typically wants to just hang out in the goal anyway (rather than being part of the action. He’s not exactly all that into soccer, we have to admit).

So there were drills and whatnot. He seemed to enjoy.

On another Saturday they worked on various skills, like running and grabbing balls:

And another one where the kids would hold on to each other and then suddently have to wrestle for control of the ball. Nyan had fun at least:

He also signed up for an after-school soccer club at his school, on Monday afternoons. Here’s a video, rather grainy because Daddy shot it from far away, on a high zoom, to keep from distracting the boy:

We were hoping that the double-dose of soccer might lead to a rapid improvement in his skills. Eh, maybe, if he really cared, but he doesn’t. And that’s okay! We will keep him in soccer a bit longer, as it’s good to learn teamwork, meet new kids, have some fun, get some fresh air and exercise.

The coaches who run Nyan’s Saturday afternoon soccer clinic thought it’d be a good idea to have teams from another soccer clinic come by for a few games. A good idea for sure – see other kids, get the competitive juices flowing, learn the value of teamwork, and all that.

Unfortunately, the kids that showed up were a little bit older and a lot bit better.

I mean, Nyan’s team wasn’t *terrible*. Not really. They just weren’t quite as experienced, I guess.

Nyan showed more interest than we might have expected, though he clearly doesn’t quite have the proverbial eye of the tiger.

Yeah, Nyan’s fairly easily distracted. Oh well, he’s having fun:

And fun is what it’s all about, really. Even though Nyan’s team lost their games by several goals – about 3-0 for each of three games, I think, though Nyan’s team did manage to score at least once — the kids had fun, as you can see from these group shots at the end.

Nyan’s soccer club had a skills competition one day in August. Let’s check in on how our boy’s football/soccer skills are coming along.

Here, he was supposed to do some footwork, some dribbling exercises, some passing, and then grab a pass-back and kick it in the net. He did pretty well!

Here’s a grainy look at Nyan doing some more drills:

Working on his defense with some fancy footwork:

At the end of the session, the coaches gave the kids little paper airplane kits. Nyan put his together and had some fun:

In September he signed up for an after-school soccer club on Monday afternoons, but wanted to stick with this Saturday afternoon club as well. Does that mean his skills will start to improve twice as fast? Who knows. Stay tuned!

Every Thursday after school, Nyan’s friend Jayden has tennis lessons on the courts at our apartment complex. They like to play after the lesson is over, so Nyan often hangs around the court. The coach is quite nice and often lets Nyan have a go. The results are…. well, let’s just say we’re not booking our tickets to Wimbledon just yet.

Bless him. He’s trying!

Here he is a couple weeks after those first two videos. A wee bit of improvement, maybe?

But he has fun. Fresh air. Socializing.

And most importantly, Nyan knows the best use for a tennis racket is as an air guitar. (And check out those foot moves!)

With Nyan turning six in July, he moved out of the introductory ‘kinder’ class at his taekwondo studio, and into the true first level. There are a range of kids there, from about his age to maybe 10 or so. Everyone is very nice and Nyan has fit in quite well.

It wasn’t an easy transition though: after a successful first class with his new friends, the little dude flat-out refused to go for the next 2 or 3 classes. Lots of tears and bawling and general stubbornness. It was pretty rough. And totally expected, the staff nicely told us: lots of kids have these issues when transitioning to a new class. (Whether that’s true, or they were just being nice, we appreciated them saying it!)

But we persevered. And we broke through, and now? he’s back to loving it.

Here he is, not long after he went back to having fun, with Mr Lee still giving him extra attention:

A few weeks later, during warm ups:

Practicing his moves. He’s getting good!

And his kicking. Still some work to be done, but definitely making improvements.

He’s still a white belt, but he’s getting better and better, and hopefully before long he’ll qualify to take the test to get a yellow belt. That will, we think, make him even more excited to continue with taekwondo.