I recently judged at Jack Dark's Battle of the 7 Cities Tournament and I had a decent time. Judging is completely relative to the person who is judging. I am no more qualified to judge there than the 8th, 9th, and 10th degree grand masters there. I did my best to ensure each child I was scoring was receiving proper attention and being scored accurately. I had only one problem with a parent who went a little ballistic thinking his child was doing better than she was. He was straitened out however.
I applaud our local martial arts masters who put on these excellent tournaments, but they are completely different than the way I would run one. First off I wouldn't have so many divisions and I wouldn't allow point based sparring. If I was to have tournament there would be an Adult Division and a Child Division and nothing else. I may categorize the children differently to give them a better chance of placing, but as for adults there would be one sparring division for all fighters. I would host a legitimate tournament and not just a trophy factory. Not that i mind getting trophies! I would have set system of scoring forms and weapons. Obviously there would be different divisions for forms and weapons, but not sparring. For instance; wielding an exhibition bo-staff or any other weapon that isn't real and is only for competition isn't really a weapon. Its a show piece. I would instruct all judges to give -1pt for a competition or exhibition weapon. +1pt for a weapon that is more difficult to wield. Judges would score people between 1 and 9. With 5 being average.
The point is, no matter what a martial art master wants you to think, most tournaments are designed to make it quick and painless for the host, director, and judges (most of whom volunteer the day of). Be wary of martial arts tournaments, they don't mean much out in the real world. I have a huge 4ft First place trophy. It makes me look like I defeated the worlds best fighters, but I am no better off than your average martial artist.
-JoKyoNim Tim
