Karatedo Shitokai New Zealand

2013 World Shitoryu Karate Federation Championships - Tokyo - Japan 15th-16th September

 

Karatedo Shitokai New Zealand, and our sister club Association Shitoryu Karatedo New Caledonia both sent teams to these championships. Both organisations combined as a group, staying in the same hotel, on the same floor, and attending the tournament together, and, as we were alphabetically one after the other, marching on together. Both organisations have a great relationship with each other, and the mutual friendship and respect was very obvious.

Our team arrived a day earlier than New Caledonia, and registered a day earlier, but on the next day, we took New Caledonia to the registration venue, then both groups visited the Meiji Shrine together (not far from the registration venue), enjoying each other’s company. Marie Jo Saintpierre and Bob were the country representatives and attended the WSKF meeting together, followed by sightseeing and a superb cruise on Tokyo Bay in the late afternoon and evening, a tremendous experience.

The tournament itself was a great experience for everyone, particularly the youngsters, Yvette Hendrickse and Tyler Picketts, who, although they both exited after the first round, gained invaluable experience of what a world tournament is all about, totally different from NZ where they may have 6 or 7 competitors in their respective age groups, whereas in Tokyo there were 50+ in their group.

 

Our two senior competitors, Dave and Kieran Nuku found the same in their sections, Dave in Veteran men 50-59 and Kieran in Senior men, where their competition was most fierce, with both exiting also in the first round. As Dave found out, there are some very good older Karateka still competing!

 

However, as with the girls, both Dave and Kieran found the experience invaluable, and everyone wants to attend the Asian Pacific Shitoryu Champs in Singapore December 2014.

Our friends from New Caledonia had a larger team than us, with nine competitors, all of them, like our team, competing at a WSKF championship for the first time. All the New Caledonia team had time with Hasegawa Sensei and Bob when they visited Noumea in June this year, and the extra training certainly showed in their performances, with several competitors reaching the second round, and two, Kenzo Nangard and Kim Faucher making it to the third round in their events, which is an excellent result for both.

The rest of their team performed very well, and their results are:
Louis Monchy 10-11 male kata and Kumite 2nd round
Romain Seigner 12-13 male kata and kumite 2nd round
Juliette Schmidt12-13 female kata 2nd round
Kim Faucher 14-15 male kata, 3rd round
Kenzo Nangard 14-15 male kumite 3rd round
David Simard 16-17 and senior men kata 2nd round both events
Angelique Mondolini senior women kata 1st round
Gregory LePironnec senior men kata 1st round
Fabrice Faucher veteran men 40-49 kata (Kim’s father) 1st round.

All in all, a great tournament for all attending, with valuable experience competing in such large groups, (average competitors per event, around 45) and the experience of Japanese culture and food was just tremendous.

As a huge bonus, the Hasegawa brothers and their students put on a special demonstration of synchronised kata to music and Yukimitsu Hasegawa demonstrated some brutally superb self defence (he also won the veteran men 40-49 kata, beating his brother in the final, proving he has lost very little of his skills). Add to that a 1000 person mass kata demonstration and traditional Japanese drumming and dancing, which really put the icing on the cake.

 

Roll on APSKF in December 2014!