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Fortress Hill 2350 S Hwy 17-92 Suite 1030

Longwood, FL 32750

Martial Arts Scorekeeping

The official Fortress Hill Martial Arts handbook for volunteering at two major martial arts tournaments, Daytona Gator Nationals and the U.S. Open ISKA World Championships.

Contents

INTRODUCTION………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….2

OVERVIEW………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….3

TOURNEMENT RULES ……………………………………………………………………………………..………………………………….4

TIME/SCORE KEEPING…………………………….…………………………………………………………………….…………………….6

HOUSE RULES……………………………………………………………………………..………………………………………………………7

IMAGES…………………………………………………………………………………………………….………………………………………..8

EMERGENCY PROCEDURES…………………………………………………………………………….……………………………………9

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Fortress Hill 2350 S Hwy 17-92 Suite 1030

Longwood, FL 32750

Introduction

Welcome!

Thank you so much for committing to volunteer with Fortress Hill Martial Arts at this year's U.S. Open ISKA World Championships, or at Daytona’s Gator Nationals! Fortress Hill is excited to have such a dedicated and hardworking group of individuals helping to run the two largest martial arts tournaments in North America.

Those who have joined Fortress Hill for previous martial arts tournaments know that no martial arts experience is needed to take part – you will be trained on how to time and score by attending a simple group instruction session at Fortress Hill Martial Arts, two weeks prior to the tournament weekend. Additionally, you will be given this handbook to act a physical reference throughout the weekend’s activities. Fortress Hill asks that you please take the time to read this entire guide, as it contains important and detailed instructions about living arrangements and volunteer behavior during the tournament weekends, as well as explains tournament procedures.

Again, thank you for lending Fortress Hill your time and effort. Please enjoy a fun and energetic weekend of watching the thrilling sport of martial arts!

Jennifer Bowman, Lauren Travers, Fortress Hill General Manager Tournament Liaison

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Fortress Hill 2350 S Hwy 17-92 Suite 1030

Longwood, FL 32750

Overview

ISKA U.S. Open

The U.S. Open ISKA World Martial Arts Championships offers competition for all ages, ranks, genders and styles. It is part of the Open World Tour – the Open World Tour Championships – which means that a high caliber of competition at the Class AA level and top competitors from all over the world will be participating. Within the last year, the U.S. Open ISKA World Martial Arts Championships has transitioned to using the Internet for cloud-based electronic scorekeeping. This change is to help facilitate the time-and-score-keeping process, insuring more accurate results and real-time updating. U.S. Open ISKA strives to make their event paperless by inputting competitor names into a scorekeeping system upon each competitor’s registration for an event; every scoring and time keeper will then be given a Tablet with access to these inputted competitor names and to other competitor information in order to set up each division. This should lead to faster result output and the ability for the U.S. Open ISKA World Martial Arts Championships to assure that its participants and fans will be able to find and view the results from events quickly. This change is also designed to add more fairness in the rings, as the scorekeeping system will electronically create brackets; additionally, the system will automatically complete tricky tasks such as account seeding and random competitor match-ups.

Daytona Gator Nationals

Florida is a great state for sport karate; often, top North American champions will return to the national competitions in their back yard just for the enjoyment of the competition. Gator

Nationals is a prime example of this, with appearances on stage and during eliminations by competitors often rarely seen. Held May 18-19 in Daytona Beach, Florida, the Gator Nationals can claim to be one of the most scenic and relaxing martial arts tournaments. Competitors and staff enjoy the opportunity to embrace sunny skies, bask in the sun and sand, and vacation in

addition to competing.

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Fortress Hill 2350 S Hwy 17-92 Suite 1030

Longwood, FL 32750

Tournament Rules

Competition Levels:

o Under Black Belt: All competitors who have not yet attained the level of black belt in his or her style compete in under black belt divisions. Under black belt division codes start with UBB-

o Class A and Class AA Black Belt: Class A divisions are amateur divisions; Class AA are

professional. Class A competitors compete for amateur World Champion titles as well as trophies, medals and other awards.

Division Types:

Forms: Traditional Form, Extreme Form, Musical Form and Creative Form.

Weapons: Traditional Weapons, Extreme Weapons, Musical Weapons and Creative Weapons.

Point Sparring: Sparring that demonstrates to the judges that the competitor could have completed a martial arts technique to a scoring area. Each technique that lands first will receive a score. The judges stop the match to call the points or award penalties and then resume the match.

*Clash Sparring: Rather than stopping at each point, the competitors can score up to three points in each exchange. The competitors break after three techniques or the center referee will break the competitors and then resume the match.

*Only at U.S. Open

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Fortress Hill 2350 S Hwy 17-92 Suite 1030

Longwood, FL 32750

Point Fighting Divisions:

o All fights are single elimination

o When setting a bracket, always start with the fight furthest on the left side of the page

and move from left to right, with the winner moving on to the next line on the right

o 3rd and 4th places will be both awarded 3rd place; the rest are Finalists

o The winner wins by a 7 point spread, or total points for 2 minutes

o Start the watch when center judge says fight; do not stop time unless he says stop time

o Red fighter is always on the judges right side; mark accordingly on your bracket

o If possible, hold your fingers up to display the score

o If a warning is issued, mark a W with a circle around it for that competitor; if two

warnings are accumulated, notify center judge

o At 1:45 yell out 15 seconds left

o 2 points awarded to a kick, 1 point awarded to a punch

o If a competitor has a fight back to back, ask the judge how much to allow between

fights (usually 1 minute)

Continuous Fighting Divisions:

o 2 Rounds of 90 seconds

o Only stop time for injury/warning

o The judges have clickers and will determine the winner at the end of the fight

o At 1:15 yell out 15 seconds left

o If a competitor has a back-to-back fight, ask the judge how much to allow between

fights (usually 1 minute)

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Fortress Hill 2350 S Hwy 17-92 Suite 1030

Longwood, FL 32750

Time/Score Keeping

Time Keeping

Forms time limit:

o 4 minutes, the clock starts when the competitor enters the ring. The competitor will

bow in and announce the name of the kata (form) only. He or she will be recognized by

the center judge and the kata (form) may begin.

Fights time limit:

o 2 minutes Point

o Two rounds of 90 seconds Continuous

o 90 second Clash

Scoring Keeping

Data input:

o Three judges per ring; each judge scores the competitor on a range of 9.90 to 9.99 o Each judge score must be inputted into Tablet (Tablet will add the numbers to compute

highest-to-lowest score) o Sign trophy vouchers for 1ST-4TH place winners

Verbal responsibilities:

o When all judges are ready to begin division, call out division name loudly three (3) times o Call out competitor names and order as competitors perform (i.e. Joe is up, Sally is on

deck)

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Fortress Hill 2350 S Hwy 17-92 Suite 1030

Longwood, FL 32750

House Rules

Pre-Tournament

There will be a mandatory volunteer training meeting given roughly two weeks before any tournament weekend at *Fortress Hill Martial Arts. If Fortress Hill has your current email address, you will receive an emailed reminder of the volunteer meeting date as well as further instructions about the tournament, arrival times, what to wear, etc. Fortress Hill asks that you please reply promptly to this email with:

Confirmation that you will be attending the training

Confirmation of the days that you will be volunteering

What t-shirt size you would like to wear for the tournament

*Fortress Hill is located at the corner of Dog Track Road and 17-92. The main doors are located at the back of the

red Peak Performance building.

For Tournament

Preliminary details regarding tournaments taking place over Friday and Saturday:

Arrival for Friday morning 9:00AM - 7:00PM

Arrival for Saturday morning 8:00AM - 4:00PM

Check-in with Mrs. Lauren Travers or Mrs. Jennifer Bowman in the lobby. The Fortress

Hill table will be located near the Official’s check-in table. (Please allow plenty of time to

park and walk inside to find where we are located; your sleeping quarters will be a

distance from the ballroom.)

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Fortress Hill 2350 S Hwy 17-92 Suite 1030

Longwood, FL 32750

Images

Tournament Locations:

Tampa Marriott Hotel

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Fortress Hill 2350 S Hwy 17-92 Suite 1030

Longwood, FL 32750

Emergency Procedures

Emergency Tournament Contacts

Officials:

Black shirt - *VIP's and **Arbitrators

White shirt - AAA Official and most likely the Center Judge

Blue shirt - AA Official and a side judge

Red shirt - A Official and a side judge

*Ask for James Li

**Ask for Murphy

Emergency Fortress Hill Contacts

Jennifer Bowman Fortress Hill General Manager (407) 265-1000 Lauren Travers Tournament Liaison (407) 496-3147 Alicia Cash Ride Coordinator (904) 707-8493