CDMA Karate Team out in force!
An excellent first competition for the CDMA karate team at the KSE10 Open Championships in Gloucester on 5th March. Bronze medals went to Oskar Lambert in Brown Belt kata 14-15 years, JF Carniaux in Male Senior kyu grade kata and Ryan John in Male Senior under 70kg kumite.
Following his strong kata performance, JF pushed his opponent all the way in kumite, only losing to a well timed mawashi geri in the end.
Oskar won his first kumite match 3-2 having scored a beautiful mawashi geri to the head against a tough opponent. He then lost a 0-0 decision but used superb movement to evade his opponent’s attacks.
Ryan John won bronze in his weight category. losing only to the eventual gold medallist, refusing to back down and earning his bronze.
After this, he fought in the open weight category and had an excellent fight against a true giant of a man. He closed down the distance, cutting off the big man’s assets, leveling the rest of the fight and meaning he only narrowly lost out to a long front hand technique, scored early on.
Hunter Enslen performed a fantastic Enpi Kata in his first round, earning a unanimous win. In the second round he earned 1 out of three flags, coming very close to progressing further. In kumite he had a tough draw in the first round against a highly skilled opponent who went on to win gold. Hunter pushed the pace all the way and used his range well to make for a close fight.
James and Richard Knipe both drew Welsh National squad members in the first round of kata but gave excellent performances with hardly anything separating them from their opponents. In Kumite, both used some excellent countering to earn 3-0 wins in the first round. James then won his next round 5-0, scoring with some more superb Gyakuzuki counters and an excellent head kick. Both boys bowed out to eventual medal winners, only losing their fights at the very end, having been on top throughout.
Amanda Stewart showed excellent resilience in very tough fight with a young member of the Welsh National team in her weight category by keeping coming forward and not backing down. She then built on this in the open weight by controlling the area with great movement, feints and attacks to dominate her fight, only losing out to a single (lucky) punch.
This was a very promising start for the team and they all gave it 100%. Well done everyone!
Tom Phillips