Question 064: Wearing glasses

Without glasses, I'm legally blind. I currently wear high impact lenses and frames with breakaway temples. I went to a tournament and was not allowed to compete in sparring because of my glasses; I was told that to be able to compete I need either safety goggles or a face shield. Which would you recommend; goggles or face shield or both?

Reply

This is question best answered by you, after consulting with your instructor to see what the eye protection requirements are in tournaments in which you will be competing, and with your eye doctor to see what is available to you and whether it meets the tournament requirements. Then you have to decide which available option works best for you

Tournaments safety rules are there to protect both competitors; when glasses break, the pieces can be a danger to both competitors. So, if you want to wear the glasses or glasses are the only way to help you vision, then, a face shield may be necessary.
Depending on the design, a face shield offers clear visibility in all directions but it does add extra weight to the head, which may slow head movement. Also, a glancing blow to the shield may shift the shield or suddenly jerk the neck.

Goggles may be fitted with corrective lenses, they will not break, they will not shift, and, depending on the design, they may or may not hamper the field of view.

Sometimes reduced vision may be an asset while sparring. With keen eyesight, fighters tend to fixate on certain things about an opponent. With reduced vision, a fighter tends to see the whole opponent and is able to detect even the slightest movement sooner than a keen vision fighter may be able to detect the same movement. Many good fighters purposely defocus their eyes or look past the opponent to take advantage of this phenomenon.