Geogia Barclay and Emily Chase,
both from Bedford High fighting in the final of the girls 8/12 years
u55kgs. Georgia won.
Garden Of England Judo Championship
Swallows Leisure Centre
Organising club Young Judo Club Sittingbourne
Sunday April 9th 2006
This event has been a part of the Judo Calendar for 10 years and attracts people from all the country in previous years we have had competitors from Europe and the USA. This years number were down a little because the date clashed with school holiday’s and a lot of children were on family holiday’s, the original date the Club required was already booked for an Indian wedding. Although numbers were down the standard of play was of an extremely high standard.
The most exciting contest of the day was between Holbrook Faversham Judo Club and Golding Spitfire Judo Club; this was fought in youth section. These two young men body movements were like cats with nine lives, they were able to twist and turn in mid air to avoid being thrown on their back, high throws were the order of the day with these two it was like a Judo acrobatics show it was a shame that their had to be a winner and that was. With three players left in contention for the medals everyone thought that Holbrook would be the Gold medallist as his next match was against the inexperienced Steve Bennett (YJC) who had already lost to on majority points score to Golding, but Steve turned the tables by seeing tired was tired and was an excellent thrower, his strategy was to beat him on the floor which he did by gaining an arm lock to win by Total Victory. Steve the under dog came out to be the Gold medallist by points.
Club mate Bob Wright put up one of his best performances to date to win Gold in the Youths Heavy Weight over, Bob has at long last realised that by correct use of his weight he can throw people, leading Senior player Danny Carrott found his old form by winning the Senior men’s comfortably.
Our Junior section are going from strength to strength with an increase in Junior membership and more expected because of the £30,000 worth of improvements at the Swale Martial Arts Club. Several of our junior’s will be competiting in Poland in June so this was the ideal event to keep their hand in. Ashley Jordan once again took Gold, this young lad is fast becoming the most successful Judo player in the South East and if he puts some weight on could become a future Lightweight Olympic potential, Sheena Fathers won her category with ease performing some good Ippon, she has really advanced in height and technique in the last few months, although only 14 years old she will be moving up to the senior section after Easter. James Marzetti won his weight in his age group easily so Coach Keith Costa let him fight in the next age group this was a real culture shock for him although he put up a good fight he could not match them strength wise, Perri Mortimer also fought in her weight winning gold and then moved up a weight to get experience and done extremely well by winning Silver in this weight as well. Zac Argent was the only player in the club to win two Gold medals; Gold medals also went to Frazier Stevens and Kieran Allan.
Attitude to Junior Judo has changed a great deal over the last 10 years with more emphasise in Child protection, Coaches are more aware of the damage some parents can do children by their excessive zeal, another realisation is that children should try and compete in their age groups and weight groups. Yet for every plus there is a minus, competing in age and weight groups has led to children having less matches in competition and in some cases this leads to a fall in standard, also if you have a very light player and he or she moves into a higher age group they sometimes have to give away a stone in weight. The previous way of competiting was to have weights and u16 years this way you had a lot of matches medals were harder to win but the downside was you could in theory have an 8 year old fighting a 15 year old, this certainly did not encourage the 8 year old to continue competing once again finding a balance. The Young Judo Club intends running an u16 year old event in the future but will try and avoid an 8 year fighting a 15 year old.
More information on Judo Telephone 01795 437124, www.sittingbournejudo.co.uk sombo@blueyonder.co.uk
Young judo club medals winners
Gold
Perri Mortimer
Sheena Fathers
Zac Argent (2 gold’s)
Frazer Stevens
Ashley Jordan
Kieran Allen
Jamie Marzetti
Steve Bennett
Bob Wright
Danny Carrott
Silver
Dervla Finlay
Niamh Finlay
Perri Mortimer
Henry Dwyer
Jordan Baxendale
Jacob Bravery
Pancho Waters
Bronze
Sadie Cullen
Sophie Donaldson
Hannah Day
Mikkaylah Wimble
William Bartup
Nathaniel Hughes
Joe Waters
Kieran Mills
Adam Argent
James Macmaster
William Macmaster
Ben Franks
Harry Hughes