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GAY PEOPLE'S CHRONICLE DECEMBER 19, 1997
Dream comes true at world kung fu meet in Beijing
by Doreen Cudnik
Cleveland-When most of us are sitting down with our families to enjoy a holiday feast or open that last present, Kelly Crocker will be halfway around the world fulfilling a lifelong dream.
Crocker, a 27-year-old social work major at Cleveland State University, will spend her holiday representing the United States at the 1997 International Shuai Chiao Kung Fu tournament in Beijing, China. Over 20 different countries will be represented at the tournament, to be held December 2326, and Crocker will be one of only a few females and the only out lesbian that she is aware of competing in the largely male-dominated sport.
The trip to China comes on the heels of her victorious competition at the 1997 Chinese-American Wushu (Chinese for kung fu) Festival, held August 16-17 in San Jose, California. At that event, Crocker became one of the first female winners in the art of shuai chiao, a wrestling style of martial arts which traces its roots back to 2697 B.C.
Translated, shuai chiao means “locking horns," as early practitioners of the art would wear headdresses when they grappled with each other, making it look like two animals locking horns. Her win was covered in the December/January issue of Quigong Kung Fu, the national magazine of the martial arts.
Crocker became interested in the martial arts at an early age. A self-described tomboy, she excelled at football, soccer and hockey. Always a big fan of martial arts movies, at age 14 Crocker began taking karate lessons.
"It was problematic, because I weighed so much," she said. "I was always a heavy person."
So she quit karate and turned her attention to football, becoming good enough to make the boys team as a defensive tackle during her freshman year at North Olmsted High School.
She was later taken off the team because, she recalls, "the coaches didn't feel it was appropriate for a woman to be playing a man's sport."
At age 19, she started taking kem po, a Japanese form of karate.
And then came an incident that would dramatically alter her life-she was jumped and assaulted by three men.
EGE
A referee holds Kelly Crocker's arm aloft as she becomes one of the first U.S. female champions of shuai chiao in San Jose August 16.
"I had my ankle broken, and the doctors told me I was going to limp the rest of my life," she remembered.
For three and a half hours, doctors performed surgery to put pins and screws in her ankle, and Crocker was forced to quit training while her body healed.
"I gained 75 pounds while I was recovering from ankle surgery," Crocker said. As her ankle got better, her weight climbed to 360 pounds.
Eventually, doctors removed the metal screws from her ankle, and Crocker was determined to go back to martial arts.
She found a new school, one that was closer to her home, the Wing Lam Kung Fu school at 7411 St. Clair Ave. in Cleveland. She began training under John Ervin, Jr., a former Ohio state trooper.
Ervin has studied the martial arts since he was five, and currently practices and teaches 26 different styles. The native Clevelander is a bodybuilder, and was ranked third in the world for six consecutive years in kick boxing and full contact fighting.
"It became my life," Crocker said of her new training program. "I worked up to training seven days a week."
By the time she was there a year, she
had progressed four levels, for which she credits "Sifu" Ervin. (Sifu means "teacher, father and master.")
"He just believed in me," Crocker said of her teacher. "He motivated me becausé he kept telling me I could do it. He made me work, but he believed in me even when I didn't believe in myself."
As for referring to Ervin in such patriarchal terms, Crocker says she just "keeps it in the context of what he is teaching me."
"He's not my father and he's not my master," Crocker commented. "But within the art, I go to him like an empty cup, and when I leave my cup is filled."
Crocker is currently studying three different disciplines, one of them the Seven Star Praying Mantis system-considered one of the most vicious of the martial arts. "It's not punching—it's trapping and breaking," Crocker said. “Every movement is a trap and a break, a block and a strike."
If three men tried to jump her again, Crocker has no doubts she could do more than defend herself.
"That's one of the reasons I went back, because after I got jumped I didn't think I was going to be able to walk again. I think
women really need to have a way of defending themselves."
But Crocker stresses that kung fu is a non-confrontational art.
"If somebody hits you, they can't hurt you you take the hit, you block it and walk away. A true student of the art would never use it aggressively, for no reason.”
She admits that there are some people who get intimidated by her involvement in the martial arts.
"Because I train with weapons, sometimes when I play pool I kind of twirl my stick and people say, 'Oh you think you're tough,'—but I'm not even thinking about it. If people took the time to talk to me they would realize I'm not a brute. That's not my attitude, that's not my perspective at all."
Crocker has just begun a relationship with a new woman who says she is "not at all" intimidated by her fighting ability. "I'm right behind her, supporting her all the way," Crocker's girlfriend said.
Crocker has achieved the level of a blue belt, which is about half way up the system that was devised as an American ranking system for the purpose of competitions. But she adds that wing lam does not focus on belts, but skill.
"The belt is irrelevant," Crocker said. "In traditional Chinese martial arts, the belt was used only to hold your uniform together."
Looking forward to the festival in Beijing, both Crocker and Ervin feel confident about her chances of bringing home a medal.
"I think Kelly has a good chance of actually winning her division," Ervin said. "If not she should definitely place in the top three."
"This is like fulfilling a dream that I never, ever imagined would be in my grasp," Crocker said. "Studying martial arts has broadened my perspective in every aspect of my life-the way I interact with people, my understanding of things, self-discipline, patience with people that act like idiots."
Crocker says her trip to China will be a "no lose situation."
"I'd like to come back home with the gold medal," she said. "I'm going to do my utmost to win, but I'm also going to be doing a study on the culture. It's really going to be an all-around great learning experience."
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