Our team is back from Portugal! Last week(September 29-October 3) our club competitors, as part of Canada’s Goju-ryu karate team ,took part in the first World Goju-ryu karate championship in Portugal, Cascais. This was great event with high calibre competitors from around the World. The organizing committee did great job on establishing a friendly atmosphere for the athletes and delegates. Officiating was on a fair level. Right from first fight we saw the difference between judging in Europe and North America. The scoring criteria was much more strict, however our juniors did a great job ! They showed a big heart in their fights and got 5 medals! This is a great result ! On the way to podium , they had to face the top juniors from Europe(some of them were medalists of the WKF European Championships and top World level juniors)
Results:
1.Vadim Semenikhine-silver 14-15yo -70 kg
2.Denis Adigamov-silver 16-17yo-68 kg
3.Michelle Pokrass-bronze 14-15yo-54 kg
4.Samantha Krystantos-bronze 14-15yo +54
5.Team fight cadets( girls 14-15)-gold
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Adult competitions were very packed with world level competitors. All of the adult divisions had around 30 competitors to face. The majority of them were at the last stage of preparation for the WKF World senior championship In Belgrade,Serbia. Despite this ,our adult competitors won a few great matches and lost only in the bronze medal bouts(Kirill Bazhenov, Gena Sereda). This event showed that our club athletes are physically and technically ready to compete at the highest level(adjustments and improvements should be focused in tactical games) . There is a large number of high level karate competitions in Europe and this is the reason why Europeans dominate at the world stage. The experience gained at this event will help our athletes perform better at the Canadian Nationals and also at international stage if they make the team.
Congratulations to all the Team members with their great performance and keep working hard to achieve those high set goals!
Sensei R.Saltikov