Shawn Sutton

Report on the General Choi cup by Gerard Kelly V Dan.

, , , ,

First of all a great big thanks must go to John Aballah and Shawn Sutton, who put in many long nights getting this tournament ready on time. The tireless work of getting a draw done for a tournament is a thankless task and Mr Abdallah does it very well indeed.

Secondly I would like to give a shout out to Mr Michael McGaw and the IL Shim Bundaberg club for turning up again, in their umpiring whites. They have really taken it upon themselves to show everyone that they have indeed been listening to my requests for this top happen.

DSC00839As we were quite a few umpires short, the day went quite a bit longer than expected, but with the mammoth efforts of Mr Fischer and Mr McGaw, we were able to get through the day! Mrs Harper put in a machine like effort marshalling, corner judging,computer entering etc!!

One of the highlights of my day was getting to patterns judge with Master McPhail!

Overall I feel that the tournament was a success. Do I think we can improve? Of course! There is always room for improvement in all aspects, and we strive constantly to review and implement the changes necessary for us to move forward.

There are too many people to thank individual so THANK YOU TO ALL THAT HELPED ON THE DAY!!!!

TAEKWON

Gerard Kelly V Dan

IL Shim umpiring director

 

/by
Shawn Sutton

Trent Hayden ITF King of the Ring

The first weekend of March was a big weekend of competition in Melbourne with the United ITF Taekwondo organisation running their Victorian Championships on Saturday, and then the ITF King of the Ring held on Sunday.

Trent Hayden of ILShim Sunshine Coast made the trip to take part in both of these events.

TrentKOR4

The Victorian Championships was held in a very friendly atmosphere, with a good range of competitors and a diverse range of experience. It was great to mix with lots of people that Trent had not met in competition before. We made some new friends and renewed some old friendships, and met a lot of nice people during the course of the day. Trent competed in patterns and sparring, winning first place in both events. He withdrew from the Special Techniques event due to not wanting to risk any injury before the Sunday competition.

ITF TKD Champion AustraliaEach year Melbourne hosts a major international fitness expo called FITX which was held at the Melbourne Exhibition Centre. This was the venue for the ITF King of the Ring. This event was a little different to our usual ITF competitions as there were no separate weight divisions. All the fighters, from the largest to the smallest, were included in the one draw in a winner take all competition to be run in a standard boxing ring. The atmosphere in the stadium was exciting with thousands of people passing through the expo and

TrentKOR3

many stopping to observe the action in the ring. All of the competitors were either past or present World Championship representatives, and reputations were on the line.

Trent thrived in this public arena and put on a crowd pleasing display of ITF Taekwon-do sparring to eventually win the event and be crowned as the ITF King of the Ring.

Trent would like to thank the organisers of both events, including Master Michael Muleta, Global Fitness Institute, and United ITF Taekwondo, for their hospitality over the course of weekend.

/by