Great start to 2016 for MartialArts4Fun Tae Kwon Do School of Excellence
It has been a busy start for Peter O’Neill’s MartialArts4Fun students with the South West Championships and the spring grading examination.
Many of the school’s students took part in the challenging exam, in front of Master Michael Dew (8th Degree Black Belt). All participating students showed great ability and helped to maintain the school’s high standards with a 100% pass rate, the following students being given special commendations for their high standards:
Advanced Passes were awarded to Josh Barnett (Bovey Tracey), Mei Wilcock (Dawlish), Tasha Harding (Teignmouth) and Ellie Townend and Kyle Jemmison (both of Ashburton), with a grading award being presented to Josh, Mei, Tasha and Kyle. A special well done to Mei, who was doing her first grading, and to Kyle who bettered his A pass from his first grading with the Ashburton award this time round.
Also worth mentioning are the following students who were awarded Plus passes (one level below the Advanced passes): Hugo Denman (Moretonhampstead), Emma Matthews and Chloe Pike (both of Newton Abbot).
The first competition of 2016 took place at the Hutton Moor Leisure Centre in Weston Super Mare with over 400 competitors from across the South West and further afield taking apart. It proved to be successful event for the 19 MartialArts4Fun students who between them competed in and won medals at all four available disciplines. This championship is a good starter competition for first time competitors but also for experienced competitors to better previous experiences. Kyle Jemmison, competing in his first competition, narrowly missed out on a medal, coming fourth in a very large category. This was quickly followed up by Molly Boyne who has only recently come back to competition and who won Bronze in Black Belt Ladies’ 2nd Dan and above patterns. Molly continued her patterns success with a well fought Bronze in Black Belt Ladies’ Sparring and a silver in Black Belt Ladies’ Team Sparring.
Other successes on the day were Nathan Wills who won Gold in PeeWee Black Belt Boys Sparring and another Gold in Tag Team Sparring. Black Belts Taya Wills and Shawna Ball joined with Red Belt Skye Kelly from Torbay Tae Kwon Do to win a Silver in Tag Team Sparring. Tilly Einzig-Pilling won Bronze in Blue Belt Girls Lightweight Sparring, Lucy Saad worked hard to win Bronze in Ladies’ Green Belt Sparring. Rachel Davis won Bronze in Black Belt Girls Middleweight Sparring and Jack Webb and Sacha Einzig-Pilling both came away with a Bronze in the large Black Belt Boys Middleweight Sparring category. Finally Ben O’Neill won Silver in the Men’s 2nd Dan and above Patterns category and bettered this in one of the last events of the day by winning Gold in Men’s Hand Destruction.
In addition to the competitors, eight of the school’s Black Belt students also volunteered to officiate and help with the smooth running of the competition. Everyone that took part gained valuable experience and all are keen to compete again in the next competition: the English Championships in March. Mr Peter O’Neill (6th Degree Black Belt), the senior instructor at MartialArts4Fun, said: “Well done to everyone for another successful grading; keep up the hard work. It is great to see so many students supporting the South West Championships. It had a great atmosphere as usual. Thanks go to all of the officials who helped the day to go smoothly and well done to everyone who took part.
More information regarding MartialArts4Fun Tae Kwon Do can be obtained by contacting Mr Peter O’Neill (6th Degree Black Belt) on 07718 750390 or www.martialarts4fun.co.uk.
