RL_Taekwondo

For the majority of the competitors it was their first ever
Taekwon-do competition. For many of them it went well. Here is
what happened.

The layout of the fights was like this: each bout was one and a
half minutes long, consisting of two rounds and a little breather in
between. First up was the junior division which had the following
people in; Michael, Zoë, Toni, Lauren and Chris. First up was
Michael, he managed to spar well against his opponent, who was
more experienced than him, and then went on to win his fight.
Zoë (who was in the same division as Michael) was up next.
She had to spar another girl who was a green belt. She had a
tough time with the fight due to the lack of experience that she
had, but did eventually win the fight. Then it was Michael's turn
again, unfortunately he wasn t so lucky and just lost his fight.
Then Zoe went on to win a couple more fights before the final.

The final was between Zoë and Mr. Austin's Son (who is a blue belt). Zoë did have a good fight and she did score quite high points but in the end was just beaten by her opponent. Zoë was awarded SILVER and Michael was awarded BRONZE after another fight for 3rd place position (well done).

Toni and Chris were also in the same division, but were both knocked out in their first fights (unlucky). Lauren won her first fight, then lost her second in a close call and was unlucky not to go further.

In the ladies adult division was Kate. Unfortunately she was unable to get a result after being knocked out
in her first round (but she did have a good fight, the only reason why I think that she lost was because that
she kept on lowering her head towards the floor which gave an easy target for her opponent).

Next to fight were the red belt male adults, which were Craig, Vikram and Terry (stepping in for Rayners Lane). As usual Vikram was up against one of the kick-boxers there, and after three minutes he won his fight. Next up to fight was Craig (having few numbers present Craig had to fight in the red belt division). He had a excellent fight against Terry. Due to Terry s exceptional kicking techniques Craig just missed out in winning the fight. Therefore Terry went through to the final. Up again was Vikram who was fighting an Edmonton student (Mark). Both were fighting for a place in the final, therefore both were very cautious about the moves made. After three
minutes of cautious sparring Vikram won and was in the final. In the final there was a good display of fighting skills, there were also a lot of points scored by both competitors and in the end Vikram just managed to win and was awarded GOLD. Terry was given SILVER (he says he would have got the gold if he was wearing his glasses) and Craig got BRONZE.

After the colour belts competition was demonstration bouts with the black belts. Both Stuart and Derrick
took part in this event and showed good controlled sparring against each other, Mr Austin & Mr Sheehan. All the black belts that competed were awarded medal for participating.