The 2017 competition season began yesterday with a trip up the M5 to north Solihull for the Daz Ellis championships.
Daz Ellis is the head coach of NSKA (national sport karate association) club and was a fantastic competitor back in his fighting days. The championship was to help raise money towards pioneering treatment to cure a condition Daz has called Motor Neuron Disease (MND/ALS)
Team EPIC took a small group up a day after our opening squad training of the season and 6 people competed.
Coaches: Andy Cleeves, Matt Roberts, Kam Doyle
Competitors: Kam Doyle, Ellie Doyle, Teia Doyle, Harrison Doyle, Katie Williams, Alex Fellender-Evans.
Kam Doyle opened his campaign with 2 golds, a straight final win in Light continuous without getting out of 2nd gear. The current world champion had a busy opening fight to his points category, beating a tough opponent 7-1 and dropping his with a trademark jump spinning back-kick. He won 6-0 in the semi finals before going to to dismantle another sharp opponent 4-1 in the final.
Teia Doyle fought well in her new categories. She had to step up from the under 8 categories and is now fighting bigger opponents. Her coaches pulled her out of her last fight before it started due to at least a whole foot difference in height and the boy had dropped an even smaller girl than Teia with a front kick to the head in the previous fight.
Ellie Doyle came back to win a bronze on a day where she could have won more. A disappointing semi final defeat left her with a third place fight off which duly returned a better performance. Ellie showed glimpses of sharpness and movement throughout her performances, scoring some good techniques but was undone with simple errors. She will be back with a bang at the KWON.
Harrison Doyle took a gold in his continuous category, beating his opponent in a close match. He slipped punches nicely at times and made his opponent move for the first half of the fight picking him off with combinations followed by roundhouse kicks. Harrison lost by a point conceded in the final few seconds of his points category.
Katie Williams took 2 golds and a silver from her 3 categories which is a strong start to 2017. She took on the advanced category which was impressive after such a short time in the sport and went against a vastly experienced competitor and gained some valuable experience before dismantling her other two categories!
Alex Fellender-Evans took a silver in points narrowly losing out 4-3 in a nail biting final! In what was easily the biggest category of the day, the young warrior dismantled most of his opponents on the way to the final before a high paced fight was decided by a single technique. Alex lost his bronze medal fight in his other category but fought well and is looking sharp at the start of 2017!
Next up is the KWON on Sunday!
