Members of Shin Gi Tai Martial Arts took part in the Karate Sport England National Championships in Harlow With squads attending from some of the biggest Karate groups in Great Britain along with some National Squads taking part it was a busy competition and a long day for everyone.
For many of the squad members this was their first competition of the year, we had a reasonably successful event winning two Gold medals, four Silver Medals and Twenty Bronze medals.
Our first competitors started competing at 9:00am with the Kata (*) categories. We have success with the ladies team Kata entries gaining a Silver medal with Lindsey Andrews, Tricia Jordan and Lynn Aston plus a Bronze Medal for Jess Muller, Georgina Butcher and Zara Hughes-White also in the same category. In the Individual events Lindsey Andrews won a Gold Medal in the Ladies Kata.
The fighting started at around 11, with most of our juniors going between Kata categories and fighting categories and in some cases been called upto compete in three categories simultaneously. It made for a challenging lunch period and one that the organisers need to address next year. Once things had settled down we got into the swing of things. Mark Nevola won the Veterans Kumite against a fancied fighter. Jess Muller made it to the final of the female cadets and worked hard to win a silver medal. Special mention in the fighting goes to Samantha Butcher, at 13 one of the younger members of the team. She had a great day fighting through to the Semi finals before narrowly losing to the eventual winner. Samantha fought her heart out all day and this was a big step up for her.
* Kata is a choreographed sequence of movements where attacking and defensive movements are practised in sequence. Kumite is fighting against an opponent