Hanshi McGrath Presents
Yasmin Rodriguez Garcia Naranjo Frank
November's
Devil Dog
In historical Lima, Peru, among the many archaeological sites of MachuPicchu and the Nazca Lines are considered as Peruvian Treasures. In this months Devil Dog addition, we will introduce you to another Peruvian treasure and the first woman to be named to this site, Yasmin Claudia Rodriguez Garcia Naranjo Frank. She is a vivacious, energetic young woman who was born in Lima, Peru in 1975. She is petite in stature and gigantic in courage, fortitude and ability. As the daughter of a Colonel in the Peruvian Army, Colonel Armando “Rocky” Rodriguez was able to travel extensively with his family and Yasmin was accorded the pleasure of seeing many of the sites that visitors from around the globe travel to by the millions every year.
She met her husband, Thomas Frank, in 1996 and together they moved to South Dakota, where he was involved with the gaming industry. They finally settled into Blue Lake, California, where they were instrumental in opening and running the Blue Lake Casino in 2002. Possibly because of the pressure of running a casino, where the work hours are rigorous, Yasmin was looking to get into some healthy physical activity and she enrolled at the Humboldt State University’s Isshin-ryu program, but, within months of her first lessons she became pregnant with her second child and had to put aside her avocation in the martial arts, until the birth of her daughter, Isabel. By March of 2003, she was anxious to get back to Isshin-ryu and enrolled with a dojo run by Sensei's Robert Sherman and Tom Nowell. Her competitive drive that she felt from the beginning drove her into the tournament circuit. She and her oldest daughter, Danika, compete together, making it a family affair and more enjoyable from Yasmin’s point of view.
In April of 2005 Yasmin entered the Cobra and Butterfly National Karate
Tournament in
Fortuna, California. She had only become a green belt a month
before, but in a stunning upset she went on to win the Green Belt Championship,
in Kumite. That opened the opportunity to fight for the Grand Championship and
with her confidence and competitive attitude; she beat the Brown Belt Champion
by the score of 5 to 0, a shutout. Revved up now, she wanted the overall
Championship and got into the ring against the Black Belt Champion, full of
confidence in her ability. Amazing the crowd, who were now cheering her on, she
again shut out
her opponent, 5 to 0 and while the crowd went wild she was
awarded the Women’s Grand Championship. Her thoughts, while she was given her
trophy, were on Sensei Nagle’s outstanding feat of winning the Okinawan
Championship as a White belt, before returning to the States. Her Sensei's
promoted her to Yon-Kyu for her outstanding achievement.
With her Sensei's accompanying her, she traveled to the East Coast and entered
The Don Nagle Memorial World Karate Championship Tournament, sponsored by the
Don Nagle AOKA, Inc. Unfortunately, she had injured her shoulder badly enough to
keep her from fighting in the Tournament. However, despite the pain she was
wracked by, she was still too competitive to travel to the East Coast and not go
for some competition. Her performance in the Kata competition,
despite her
condition, was excellent and she walked off with Second Place and added another
trophy to her collection. Since I had been corresponding with Sensei Tom Nowell,
by e-mail for some time, he brought her over at the start of the Tournament, to
meet me. I found her to be a bright, young woman, with a dynamic energy and
self-confidence, which she later proved. She is humble and has a pleasant
personality, despite her sky rocketing reputation. Since I am a frustrated
archaeologist wannabe, we engaged in a conversation about the many worldwide
known sites of interest in her homeland. It turned out that she had been to most
of the sights and I found her knowledge of them to be very interesting. Within a
few weeks I received pictures of her at Machu Picchu and others with her
Sensei's.
After her performance and knowing her background, I decided that she was the
perfect individual to be our first female “Devil Dog.” There will be many more
included in this category, but
she is the first. While in our area, she took the
time to an Isshin-ryu Shrine, visiting Sensei Nagle’s last headquarter dojo, in
Jersey City (which was the site of the long visit by Tatsuo Shimabuku, Soke)
which was left in the capable hands of one of Sensei Nagle’s original New Jersey
students, Dennis Hoare, Ku-Dan, who gave his visitors a demonstration of his
knowledge of attacking nerve centers. Master Sherman made sure that they had
time to bring Mrs. Frank to see his Sensei, Master Fitzgerald, who is on our
Board of Directors. He demonstrated kata interpretations and gave her his
“technique of the millennium.” One week later, she used Master Fitzgerald’s
technique to place first in kata in the Green Belt division at Redding,
California. She doesn’t seem to gather mass, going from tournament to
tournament. That competitiveness and drive in her training schedule comes from
the motivation of her father “Rocky,” a martial artist who inspired her. Sadly,
he passed away on August 7, 1996 and she thinks of him, as she collects honors
in the art. She thanks her Father and her Sensei's for her great, good fortune.
I hope to see her at our next tournament and hopefully get the opportunity to
see her fight.