GOING FOR GOLD

Tariq Malik

Eric Fober pulls no punches about his dedication to karate-do.

“This is pretty much my life, it’s school first, but then karate,”

said Eric, a 14-year-old Huntington Beach resident preparing for the

sport’s national competition in July.

For the last six years, Eric has arranged his life around the sport,

rising in the ranks to a second degree black belt, which he achieved last

December.

The Boys & Girls Club of Huntington Valley introduced him to karate

when he was 8, after his parents enrolled him in a summer program while

they worked.

“I just wanted to try it,” Eric said. “I was at an age where I was

really into martial arts, you know, kung fu.”

Last month, he won gold medals at a national qualifier competition in

Westminster, dominating the categories of kata, a contest of form and

movement, and kumite, where participants spar with an opponent.

“It’s exciting because there’s this feeling, a thrill I guess, that I

get knowing that I’m attempting to do my best,” Eric said, adding that

going from lessons to national competitions is like going from Little

League baseball to the pros. “I think the excitement comes from wanting

just to see how far you can go.”

Despite all his numerous awards and trophies, Eric’s karate success

may have never happened.

“It could have been very different,” said Tom Fober, Eric’s father.

“After his first year, he stopped. He played AYSO soccer and went to

school, but he could have not returned to the sport.”

Trophies, medals and award certificates sit among the shelves and

walls of his Huntington Beach bedroom amid posters of action film star

Jackie Chan.

Tom Fober, and his wife Carmen, laud their son’s karate-do passion

because it has taught him a self-confidence and self-control that other

children his age may not be exposed to.

This year will mark his fourth appearance in the national

championships, which will be held in Houston, and could lead to a showing

in the Junior Olympic Games, where he competed two years ago.

Eric learned under the club’s karate-do instructor Akira Fakuda, an

eight-time national champion of karate who has also been a member of the

U.S.’s national team and the Olympic Committee. Fakuda’s wife, Doris, was

a member of the Peruvian national karate team.

“He’s a great athlete, and many people say he’s really matured under

the sport,” Fakuda said. “As his coach, I’m always trying to get more out

of him, but he’s really your typical all-American. The next step is him

wanting it himself, that’s the most important.”

After years of training in the sport under Fakuda, Eric now assists

during the Boys & Girls Club’s lessons, which Fakuda said emphasizes

leadership, spirit-building and self esteem.

“I help teach because I want the students to advance to competitions,

to have the chance that I did by learning from Akira,” he said.