Getting their kicks in Woodbridge

Published in the Home News Tribune 1/01/05

Teenage Fords karate students are competing around the globe

By ARIELLE LEVIN BECKER
STAFF WRITER

WOODBRIDGE: They enter like any teenagers might, bouncing around in their jeans and puffy jackets and gym shoes. Jessica Campos, 18, and her sister, Janette, 15, chat with each other and joke around with friends as they wait for class to begin.

But within a few minutes, it's time for the lesson. They change into their gees -- white robes with black belts -- and step onto the mats, ready to fight. Soon they are throwing their classmates, flipping them over and landing on top, with arms ready to punch.

It's a typical weeknight for the Campos girls, who along with classmates Adam Lasota, 15, and Michael Molina, 17, spend most of their evening hours practicing their karate kicks, punches and sparring moves at Bressaw's Karate School in Fords. So far the activity has taken them across the world -- most recently, they competed in the Kimura Shukokai Karate world championships in South Africa.

For the four teenagers from Edison and Woodbridge, their extracurricular hobby instills philosophical, as well as physical, lessons, something they say prepares them for far more than just their time on the mats.

MIKE McLAUGHLIN/Special to the Home News Tribune

Jessica Campos, 18, left, spars with her younger sister, Janette, at Bressaw's Kimura Shukokai Karate School in Fords. The two competed in the Karate World Championship last August in South Africa along with Michael Molina and Adam Lasota.

"It's something I can take with me for the rest of my life," said Molina, an Edison resident who has been practicing for 5 1/2 years. "Anybody can do it, so I can take it until the day I die."

The other three share Molina's devotion.

Jessica Campos, a freshman at Kean College who grew up in Port Reading, spends five days a week at the dojo, two for practicing and three to teach.

"I love it," she said. "It's like having another family."

Janette, a sophomore at Woodbridge High School, comes along each time -- her sister is her ride, she explains.

The sisters began eight years ago after searching for an after-school activity. Their first stop was ballet at a local rec center. They lasted two weeks.

"It didn't work out very well," Jessica said.

"We're not really like the girly girl type," her sister explained. "Ballet was all twirling and stuff."

Karate involves twirls too, but they tend to end with someone getting kicked.

Their practicing paid off earlier last year, when they competed in the world championships, organized by Shukokai Karate instructors around the world. Jessica Campos earned a gold and two bronze medals in the women's division, while Janette Campos scored a bronze medal in the women's 14-15-year-old division, and Molina won a bronze in point fighting in the men's 16-17-year-old division.
Lasota, a sophomore at Woodbridge High School, came within one match of medaling. He's now focused on the next world championships, in Finland in two years.

Of course, there are side effects. Don't try to tap Jessica on the shoulder -- it might end in a throw.

"I'm ready for it," she said, smiling. She can't help it. "It's a second sense, almost," Lasota says.

Molina balances karate with his college applications -- he's a senior at J.P. Stevens High School in Edison -- and activities including key club, Spanish honors society, concert choir, jazz ensemble and chess club. He studied tapes of his performance at the first world championship he attended in England two years ago to determine how to improve his performances.

Lasota, who still keeps in touch with the friends from around the world that he made in South Africa, also teaches classes, one of the requirements of advanced students in teacher Bill Bressaw's school. He does his homework before karate class, which he said provides him with energy, self-defense skills and a good workout.

But along with the physical strength karate creates, the ability to pin an opponent without breaking a sweat, comes the importance of restraint, Bressaw said.

A lawyer by day, Sensei by night, Bressaw leads his classes in both physical and philosophical exercises. Required concepts include ideas from Sun Tzu's "The Art of War" and a psychology book called "Power vs. Force: The Hidden Determinants of Human Behavior," by David R. Hawkins.

Indeed, the difference between power and force is a key idea Bressaw stresses to his students. Force, he says, indicates resistance -- it's only physical, and relies on brute strength. But power, which he tries to instill in his students, is entirely different, he said. It's an idea that is good for people, something others will respect and follow without external compulsion.

It's a serious undertaking for Bressaw, who operates dojos in Edison and Fords. As one of four world chief instructors for Kimura Shukokai style karate, the type taught at his dojo, Bressaw tries to inculcate in his students an understanding of the legacy of Shihan Shigeru Kimura, who founded the style and taught Bressaw before he died in 1995.

Photographs of Kimura line the walls of the dojo, and Bressaw invokes the legendary teacher's name frequently.

"I'm trying to develop the next generation of martial artists," Bressaw said. "I want to make sure what they're learning is useful, not useless."

MIKE McLAUGHLIN/Special to the Home News Tribune

From right: Jessica Campos, 18, Adam Lasota, 15, Janette Campos, 15, and Michael Molina, 17, practice with their black belt class at Bressaw's Kimura Shukokai Karate School in Fords. All four competed at the Karate World Championship last August in South Africa.