Jacob Grace has been knocked down, literally and figuratively, more times than he would like to remember.
“When I first started competing, it was in the color belt division, and I would lose all the time and the tears would come out,” Grace said. “There’s been a bunch of times when I’ve wanted to quit, but with the support of my mom, my master and my aunt who kept pushing me to continue, that really opened the door for me.”
Grace kept getting back up, kept getting better and soon found himself at a level where the Olympics are a real possibility.
He has risen through the ranks of national taekwondo competition, eventually becoming a USA Junior National Team Member in 2012 and this past year earning a spot on the US Senior National Team.
The goal now is to continue to compete in tournaments and invitationals around the world—he just returned from Mexico for the Pan American Championships and will travel to South Korea in July and Costa Rica in August—and build up a world ranking and eventually make the Olympic team in 2020.
Grace already has logged many miles in a plane going around the world and will see those miles increase even more as he makes his bid to earn a spot in the Tokyo Games.
The Top 5 ranked competitors receive automatic spots in the Olympics otherwise he must go through Olympic qualifying procedures.
Grace said there is a website which lists the rankings, but only the top 300 are included.
He said he was so excited when he cracked the list but has seen his stock rise since.
Grace is now ranked No. 112.
He said sometimes he looks at his ranking and can’t believe he is actually that good, even with his supporters talking up how well he’s doing.
But this past year, Grace said, he earned a win against a top ranked athlete that showed that just maybe is that good.
He fought against last year’s Pan American champion and was ranked No. 10. And he won.
“It was a really huge accomplishment for me,” Grace said. “… After that fight and realizing ‘I’m winning? That’s happening right now?’ And after I won, I couldn’t fathom what was going in my head.”
And he said he owes much of his success—along with his master and his aunt—to his mother and her support.
“Whatever we pursued, we’d go 100 percent. We’re not going to call it quits halfway through,” Grace. “A lot of that hard work and motivation came from my mom.”
Grace’s father died in 2005 leaving his mother to raise for children.
They had moved from Hawaii to Santa Monica and then had to move to Oregon to be with his grandparents.
“It was a lot for her just wanting us to succeed regardless of how she felt,” Grace said. “This is a little bit of a payback for her because all this hard work to get us to where we are now shouldn’t go to waste.”
Grace was initially introduced to American Taekwondo Center—where he now teaches—at the age of 12 while he was still living in Oregon. He got involved up there and after high school, made the decision to move to Morgan Hill to continue his training.
When he first started taekwondo, Grace said it was a chore.
“At first I really didn’t like it,” Grace said. “I really hated coming, which is kind of ironic because I’m a sparing athlete and that was the worst part for me.”
Aunt brought him to his master’s attention and that opened the door to him competing.
Grace said his master, Chae Song Mun, really took some time with him to help train him to get better.
He said the effort from his family and his master didn’t go unnoticed.
“If they’re doing this for me, then obviously they see something in me,” Grace said. “I don’t always see it in myself, but the fact I had so much of his moral support truly inspires me and keeps me motivated.”
Even though he kept at it, Grace said 2013 was probably one of his worst years in the sport, but he has seen much growth as a result of the adversity.
He was at the national championships in Chicago and lost in his first fight.
“That was a little bump in the road I had to climb over,” Grace said. “Next two years, in 2014 and 2015 I won nationals twice in a row.”
And when there were tough times, Grace always had his mother’s strength to fall back on.
“She would say bad things are happening, but let it slide,” Grace said. “You don’t need to get frustrated or get angry at yourself or others. Just do what you need to do, push forward and you can succeed,” Grace said.
As Grace makes his push in to more and more tournaments, he is always seeking donations to help him cover the cost of travel.
“Crowd-funding right now. I have a Go Fund Me page that I used for this tournament in Mexico,” Grace said.
He has sponsors for his equipment, but he is still looking for help to cover travel.
