I think you need to first understand how Olympic TKD works. For instance, do you realize that each country, other than the host nation, can only send a maximum of 4 players to The Olympics? The host nation can send 8.
Then you need to understand the whole qualification process. Qualifying the weight division and then qualifying yourself for that weight division. It is incredibly complex and convoluted. It is nothing like just going in and beating someone and making the US Olympic Team.
You do have a pretty cool opportunity coming though in the next couple of months, if you are available to escape France and travel to the USA.
O
n April 5th, in Des Moines, Iowa 3 out of 4 of the US Olympic team members will be chosen. The 4th is Steven Lopez who secured his spot on the team a few months ago in Manchester, England. The other 3 "Top Seeds" for the USA are Steven's brother Mark, His sister Diana and Charlotte Craig. All 3 failed to qualify their divisions in Manchester after qualifying themselves a few months prior. Then in December those 3 were able to qualfy the weight divisions in their last opportunity in Cali Columbia. If they hadn't then the US would only be sending Steven Lopez to Beijing.
So since they qualifed the divisons again in Cali now they again need to qualify themselves.
This weekend in Colorado Springs at the Olympic Training Center was the fight-off to see who would be their opponents at the final fight off in Iowa.
On April 5th, Nia Abdallah will fight Diana Lopez for the Women's Featherweight spot. Nia was the 2004 USA Olympic Silver Medalist. Nia will need to win 2 fights against Diana to win the team spot while Diana, as the top seed, needs only beat Nia 1 time to go to the big show. This is expected to be a very exciting match as Nia lost this spot to Diana in the August team trials and everyone that was there agrees that Nia actually won their fight.
On April 5th, Chris Martinez will fight Mark Lopez for the Men's Featherweight spot. There are some saying the Chris may "Bow Out" to Mark. They both train at Elite TKD in Sugarland Tx and are trained by the elder Lopez, Jean who is also the USA Team Coach. Sending Steven, Diana and Mark to the Olympics for Team USA would be the first time that 3 siblings have competed at the same Olympics in the same sport since something like 1908. Should they fight it out, Chris would also need to defeat Mark 2 times where Mark only needs to win 1 to go to the big show.
On April 5th, Anees Hasnain will fight Charlotte Craig for the Female Flyweight spot. I have no idea who Anees is but Charlotte is someone that my daughter has fought a few time and we have seen her compete many more times. She is a lot of fun to watch. Some say that she only got her opportunity because Mandy Meloon was removed from the team after a serious mental breakdown. Charlotte has made the most of the opportunity though by captuing bronze medals at the 2006 Jr World Championships in Vietnam and following up in 2007 with a bronze at the Sr World Championships in Beijing. Again, Annes must beat Charlotte twice while Charlotte only needs to beat Anees 1 time to go to the big show.
So the bottom line is that on April 5th, in Des Moines Iowa, 3 out of the 4 US Olympic TKD Team spots will be secured. Also, just for good measure, on April 4th in Des Moines the 20 USA Jr Team Members to fight at the 2008 Jr World Championships in Turkey will be chosen from the results of a Round-Robin fight off based on those finishing in the top 4 at the recent Jr World Championships Open in Colorado Springs.
Finally, add in that April 5 and 6 in Des Moines is the 2nd of the 5 National Qualifiers for USAT Jr Olympics and Senior Nationals and you have yourself 1 hell of a weekend of sport TKD. Choosing the top seeds for Nationals, the 10 member Jr National Team and 3 of the 4 Olympic team spots.
If you are the least bit interested in Olympic TKD, I don't see how you can miss this event!!!!
If you can't be there, you can follow all the action at
http://www.usa-taekwondo.us
