Karatedo Shitokai New Zealand

2012 Hamilton Open 25th March

Karatedo Shitokai New Zealand took a team of six competitors to the Hamilton Open on Sunday 25th March. This tournament has become a traditional journey for our organisation, and since the demise of the Northland Open, the first "hit out "of the NZ tournament season.

It is always great to go to Hamilton (despite leaving Whangarei at 5 AM!). It is a well attended and organised tournament and most of the top players were there. This year we took two young 10/11 year old girls to experience their first tournament (Olivia Crum and Yvette Hendrickse). They have been doing extra training with Sensei Bob, and it showed with Olivia first and Yvette second in the 10/11 years female Kata. Both girls have much potential and hopefully they will continue to train hard. They will be interesting to watch in the years ahead.

We also took Nicky Roberts, Alicia Bezier (from New Caledonia), Zara Wech, and Matthew Baird. They all did very well, with Matthew Baird winning Gold in Senior Men Kata, Nicky and Alicia Gold and Silver in Senior Women Kata, Alicia Gold in Junior Women Kata and Zara Wech Gold in Junior Women lightweight Kumite.

Nicky looked excellent in her first competition, and her explosive power is improving all the time (she now attends University in Auckland amd is training very hard, around 20 hours a week, both on her own and at Fushinryu, plus Sensei Bob meets her every fortnight for specialised training. It seems to be working very well, judging by her Hamilton performance, and we have Hasegawa Sensei in Whangarei for his annual NZ visit at Easter, before the NZ Open, which will  improve her even more.

Alicia Bezier from our New Caledonia sister club, who has been home staying with Sensei Bob and his Wife since early January, is looking quite superb, winning the Junior women kata, and making the final against Nicky, surprising a few people in the process. Her progress since she has been in NZ has been startling to say the least, and the NZ Open will be interesting, as she has improved further since Hamilton.

Finally, both Zara Wech and Matthew Baird looked good and on track, with Matthew losing nothing since last year, despite doing no extra competition training this year. Matthew has decided to choose his tournaments this year and will not be competing at the NZ Open, which is unfortunate, because he would have put up a good level of competition against the other elite Kata male competitors.