Protection

I really like karate for all the reasons listed below.

• The fact that there is quite a lot of theory to learn, makes it interesting. 
• The need to practice to control your body, makes it challenging. 
• Focusing your mind and performing under pressure improves you strength of mind.
• You can practice anywhere and don't need special kit, so it is both convenient and suited to the self-conscious.
• Lastly, it makes you fit with all the benefits that come from being healthier and looking better.

These are all good things. There are for me however, two things I don't like:

• The threat of injury.
• Sparring.

I say "threat of injury", because I've never really been injured, neither has anyone else in the class, excluding bruises and a mildly sprained finger (you soon learn to tuck them away!), but I fear injury. This isn't entirely rational since as previously discussed, sparring is not fighting and in our class the body is the only target. No heads strikes permitted. You should make contact, but not hard enough to cause injury or discomfort. So the only real risk comes from error or loss of control. Unfortunately, I make errors and don't yet have much control. So here's the problem - it's the most junior people who are the most likely to get injured. I also tend to get paired with one of the other two females in the class who are like me - junior, not very good, lacking much control and not very keen on the whole sparring idea. Infrequently, I get to spar with one of the blokes. This is great for me and totally crap for him! I get lots of instruction and he gets - to be really careful. Also once you feel you're bad at something, it's a self-fulfilling prophecy. Now when it's find-a-partner time, the unpaired female in the class is left like the unpopular kid during games who never gets picked for the team.

One thing that has helped is a chest guard. The blokes never mentioned these - hand and shin guards yes, boob protectors, no. We (the three women) discovered them after one of us received a blow to the boobs. Each of us now uses a different one. Mine is shown below.

The Cimax Econoguard, £25 approx. Particularly good since it has straps like a bra and fits really well. At least now I have no concerns regarding injury to the body and interestingly the blokes are a lot more relaxed, since the last thing they want to do is hurt anyone and boobs do take up most of the target zone on the front of the body. Now we can all relax.