Recently, twelve students from Stamford and Oakham Taekwon-Do Club competed at the GTUK British Championships held in Coventry.

Competitors came from all over the country and a team travelled from Scotland to compete in the popular competition.  Students competed in patterns, sparing, destruction and special technique.  

The competition was fierce in all categories, but the local students managed to scoop 12 medals in total between them in various categories of the Martial Art.  

Tom Chappell, an instructor at Stamford and Oakham Taekwon-do, said: "Yellow belt, Elon Klitovchenko, started the medal tally off by winning Gold in Peewee (6 - 7 Years) Mixed Patterns and then went on to secure a Silver for Sparring – what a great achievement for his first competition! 

"Red Belt Black Tag, Ashleigh Harrison won a fantastic Gold in Junior (14 – 16 Years) Female Patterns and secured a Silver Medal in a tough Junior Female Sparring category."

Since then, Ashleigh has earned her black belt. Read about her achievement here.

Competition was fierce in Coventry. Image credit: Tom Chappell.

Tom continued: "One of our Junior Blackbelts, Ethan Lam, also at his first competition secured Bronze in Junior Patterns and a Gold Medal for a great performance in his Sparring category. Callum Wallis who has competed at a number of tournaments now secured a Silver Medal in his Sparring category.  

"Johnathan Brewell secured Gold in a tough Sparring category, whilst Stewart Needham and Keith Gilbody picked up a Silver Medal and Bronze Medal respectively for their performances in their Patterns category.  Black Belt, Jo Auciello finished off the haul of medals with a super Bronze in Patterns and Silver in Sparring."

The tournament sees the club go from strength to strength and the team of Instructors are extremely proud of all of the competitors who took part as they truly competed with the tenets of Taekwon-Do at heart.

Well done to all involved. Image credit: Tom Chappell.

For further information regarding the Club, please go to the website at www.tkdclasses.co.uk where you can find contact details including venues and times of when the club trains.