Ian Rico

From Survival Of The Fittest

Name: Ian Stefan Rico
Gender: Male
Age: 15
Grade: 10th
School: Bathurst High
Extra Curricular Activities: Martial Arts and Paintball

Description: Standing at 5'9" Ian doesn't look too intimidating. He is not hugely muscular, but not lanky. He is built pretty well from exercise, but still, he isn't built like a tank. He isn't too tan, with a rather light complexion despite people thinking he is Spanish by his middle and last name.

He is only a quarter Spanish in reality. He has short dark hair and green eyes. He has no siblings which means he gets bored pretty quickly at his house. His parents are still together and want the best for Ian, so they tried to get him into sports. Trying his hand at football, soccer, and baseball he found out he wasn't as good as the other kids, and wasn't as coordinated. When he was 11 his father enrolled him in a local martial art school that taught a form of karate known as Shorie-Goju-ryu.

At first Ian enjoyed it for it just got him out of the house and taught him how to defend himself, until his first tournament. Ian got third place and he realized that he could make something out of this. He started to practice more and train harder, always sparring and learning from the older teachers, he began to realize this was what he wanted. It was when he was 13 that he played paintball for the first time with his friend. Quickly falling in love with it, he started to ask his parents for money and spent time on paintball gear, going to a field every weekend to play and get better.

He started to slack on his martial arts as he became more and more involved with paintball. He loved the thrill of getting shot at, the thrill of shooting at others, the adrenaline and the action. He was asked to join a local team, and soon they were on their way to participate in the NPPL. He was 14 when he finally got his blackbelt, and he was joining local small tournaments and winning them. He was still slacking on his martial arts, as he decided to skip a very important tournament for the NPPL paintball tournament. He and his team got 4th place in the amateur category and Ian was proud of himself. It was then that he and his teammates got jumped by a rival paintball team walking to their hotel. Using his martial arts Ian managed to fight them away, and he realized that he needed to make priorities.

He was a good paintball player, but a better martial artist. He began the next year devoting everything he had to the art form, learning everything he could, and he began to fight adults in tournaments, and win. He was going to participate in the state tournament, when he got a call from his paintball teammates about a major tournament that could bring them some serious fame and some sponsors. Torn between two worlds, Ian chose to go to the paintball tournament, winning it with his teamates, but missing out on the state martial artist tournament.

He found out that there were people at the tournament who were asking for him, interested in scouting him out for the US Olympic team, and that surprised Ian. He never thought of himself as that great of a fighter, but his priorities had been too twisted to realize what could have been.

By 15 he figured out how to successfully split his time between karate, and paintball, excelling at both, he would still wonder the what ifs of his karate career, but put it aside, he was a realist. He realized he was only 15, and that he needed to focus on his studies more than anything else, even though he failed at doing that, carrying in mostly average grades.

Clique: Ian is mostly reserved and quiet, he doesn't have a "clique". He hangs out with anyone who is willing to hang out with him.

Relationships:
Sofie de Wilde - One of Ian's closest friends who he enjoys talking to and spending time with, and even though Ian is usually reserved and shy, she is one of the few people who have seen his true personality.

Lavender Heart - Another one of Ian's friends who he talks to in class sometimes.

Other: Ian is mostly quiet and reserved, and very respectful to everyone he meets. When he steps onto the paintball field or onto the mat to fight his opponent for karate though, it is like he is a different person. Something changes in him and he becomes almost like an animal, fighting fiercely to the end, but once it is over he reverts back to his original attitude and becomes very respectful and calm and collected again. He can be shy at times, and is rather intimidated by girls.