Western Karate Union Spring Championships 2016

On the 1st of May Charan and Amrit Dhesi, along with Dad Mak of course, made the long trip down to Western super Mare for the WKU Spring Invitational. Regular medallists at this competition, expectations were high that we could repeat results of old. Unfortunately that wasn't the way it panned out, but that's not to say they came home empty handed.

The kata sections are usually a good source of silverware so to speak, but today it proved a completely barren discipline. With two individual events, and one pairs event, no medals at all was extremely disappointing conclusion. Having seen none of their performances it is difficult to say why this was the case. Hopefully though it will serve as a valuable lesson that we cannot rest on our laurels and hard work for both maintenance and improvement of standards is what is required.

Kumite thankfully restored some sort of order, as Amrit pulled out some of his best performances for a long while to win the gold medal. More pleasing for me was not the medal itself, more the approach to his tactics. For a long while we have been working on all manner of approaches rather than all out attack. On this occasion he was thinking, moving, and preserving leads he had established like a real tactician. He began to listen to the coach and let them devise a strategy which allowed him to concentrate on his techniques and skill.

Overall a disappointing result by their standards, but let's not lose sight of the fact that as they get older their opponents become wiser. Hopefully the kata results will be a lesson in not to become complacent, and the improvements in kumite tactics are here to stay.

 

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