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Competitor Profile on Damon Gilbert
By Boice Lydell
From Sport Karate Magazine
(Sept-Oct 2000)
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Date of Birth: August 2, 1973
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I’ve hosted front cover player interviews for over 10 years now. During that tie I’ve questioned them all, from 10 year old to 50 years old-from grade school students to housewives-from the meek and mild to the big and boastful, but this was a first-an interview with a police officer while on the job. As I asked him questions on his cellular phone I could hear the life of Oakland, California from his car window in the background and was interrupted frequently with questions from passersby that were directed to my interviewee. Of course his line of duty would come first so I’d patiently wait and listen. The best was when a fellow asked him who he was talking with and he responded with the truth “I’m being interviewed for the front cover of a karate magazine”. I don’t recall the conversation going much further-I’d like to have seen the expression on the guy's face! Such is the real life of world champion fighter Damon Gilbert, a police officer for the crime prevention unit in Oakland, California. Gilbert enjoys the exciting life as a police officer, a life that several of his karate schoolmates and relatives have also chosen for a career. The action, challenges and unpredictability of his job mirror image much of the excitement he’s experienced in his sport karate life as well. Sometimes a little more unpredictably in sport karate that he’d like however. For instance the recurrence of a minor stroke called bells palsy in 1991 leaving him for a second time with numbness to the left side of his face. The fist time happened four years earlier when he was in 9th grade and then occurred again the week before his black belt test in 1991. His drive and determination got him through a grueling test however. Never was his perseverance as evident as last year however. He was so ill with a flu called “vertigo motor sickness” that during the entire Super Grands as he was defending his super heavyweight point sparring world title, he spent every non sparring minute of his five day stay in bed with a 105 degree temperature. But with all his challenges have come his highs in sport karate and of course leading the list would be his six world titles in heavy, super heavy and team point sparring. Actually his only loss for a world title in individual sparring at the World Games came in 1995 to Ray Wizard in the heavyweight division. But Gilbert got his revenge taking it back from Wizard in 1996. The 1996 Super Grands were also special to Gilbert because he learned during the games that he had passed the written exam to allow him entry into the police academy. The only Super Grands he missed were the following year because he was in the academy at that time. Gilbert’s career had really taken off the year he won his first title in 1993. It was earlier that year that he was chosen to represent Russ Folkes’ PKC USA Team. Gilbert refers to this step and accomplishment as being the “pinnacle of his career” and still appreciates the faith that Russ Fokes had in him. But perhaps one of Gilbert’s biggest highlights wasn’t his own accomplishment at all, but that of his father’s. His father’s recent promotion to a sixth degree blackbelt in Kajukenbo by founder Dechi Emperado was a highlight not just for his father, Tommy Gilbert, but equally for Damon. His father, the owner and founder of the Best in the West (BITW) karate schools has been the overall riding influence in his life, sometimes even when he didn’t want him to be. As a karate instructor his father naturally wanted him to excel in martial arts. Damon Thought otherwise, wanting to be a baseball star. His father convinced him that the training of martial arts would help his baseball, which admittedly he wasn’t good at. After a karate tournament or two he found that he was a natural at fighting and at winning the trophies, so at a young age when trophies are the untimate desires soon switched gears. But even into his high school and college days he enjoyed other activities, including acting which he even considered as a career. As a student in drama clubs or drama classes in both high school and college, Gilbert finally had to realize that an “Eddie Murphy” he wasn’t and it was always back to his natural – karate. Gilbert relates that his mid teenage years when his most memorable karate experiences. Times getting the crap beat out of him in class by other BITW greats such as Mark Hicks, Earl Jones and Butch Herndon. He stated that the old first dojo behind his dad's house still has imprints of his body broken through the sheet rock walls! But nothing stirs up old memories more than the thoughts of cram packed van loads of 15 or more on their way to the old Ed Parker Internationals where greats such as Johnny Gyro, Satch Williams, Nasty Anderson and Billy Blanks claimed fame. As for the present, at 27 years old Gilbert says he is far from through. As a member of the “Bay Areas’ Best” team for a second year in a row he intends to win another title or two this year. He credits coach and sponsor Michael Dobashi for part of his continued interest and says it’s great to be coached by his number one fan. |
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