Eyeworld

OCTOBER 2019 | EYEWORLD | 71 O under Sensei Sonny Kim for his first 2 years. Dr. Hura had to change his routine during his third year of medical school, however, when Sensei Kim was killed in the line of duty as a police officer. Dr. Hura took on more teaching at the dojo and continued self-training. He was able to maintain this routine until the start of residency, when its long hours began to conflict with regularly scheduled classes and he was forced to train at odd hours. Still, in the midst of his ophthalmology residency, Dr. Hura said karate remains important to him, though clinical care, studying, research, and other ophthalmolo- gy-related endeavors remain the top priority. Time balance If you make something a priority, you will incorporate it into your life, Dr. Hura said. "In my opinion, 'balance' is all relative to what you consider important," he said. "We all have the same amount of time every day; how we spend it depends on our personal preferences." He added that he's never had a problem training or exercising because he makes it a priority. "I also think that if one prioritizes physical fitness and health, whether that includes practic- ing a martial art or any other regular physical ac- tivity, the need to find 'stress-relieving' activities will diminish, as one's lifestyle will intrinsically be that of off-loading stress," Dr. Hura said. Competitions Dr. Hura participated in competitions in the past but has not for some time. "I went through a phase when I was younger where I competed two to three times a year," he said. However, when his interests shifted to working on the more biomechanical and technical aspects of martial arts, he stopped competing and has not in almost 15 years. That being said, he men- tioned that lately he has "felt that competitive desire beginning to resurge." Competitions can be individual or as a team. "Most competitions consist of kata (pre-arranged forms) and kumite (sparring), and some feature embu (pre-arranged demonstra- tions)," he said. continued on page 72 Team kata is done with a group of three performing the same kata at the same time, ideally in perfect synchro- nization and harmony. Kumite can also be done as a team, with a different competitor from two teams facing off during each round. When he was competing, Dr. Hura competed in kata and kumite, as well as team kata. Team kata training is based on synchro- nizing each individual's performance with the other two teammates and making sure that ev- ery technique is executed with the same biome- chanics and timing, Dr. Hura said, adding that team kata involves a triangle formation. "It can be a very hard thing to do properly, but a well synchronized and executed team kata perfor- mance is a beautiful display to behold," he said. Similarities between karate and ophthalmology Upon entering medical school, Dr. Hura was first interested in neuroscience, but af- ter extensive time shadowing and working in Neurology clinics, he realized that it wasn't for him. "Within days [of discovering ophthalmol- ogy] I knew it was the right specialty for me. I enjoy the dualistic medical and surgical aspects of the profession, the ability to transition at any point between academics, private practice,

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