The presentation for these Awards took place on Tuesday 19 December 2006, at the Lyonsdown Hall dojang.

The Student of the Year for 2006 is Chris McCarthy , 7th Kup. He receives a certificate and engraved trophy.

Student of the Year 2006 Chris McCarthy (right)
Most Promising Student 2006 Alfie Huggard (left)

Chris has maintained a great attitude to Taekwon-Do since he joined the school. He works hard and has improved greatly in a short space of time.

His diligent work in class has paid off with his tournament performances: he picked up Gold for Patterns at the London Open 2006, and Silver in sparring at the ITF England Championships 2006!

With his confident and mature approach to training, I expect him to go from strength to strength as he advances up the ranks.

Congratulations to Chris!

The Most Promising Student for 2006 is Alfie Huggard , 9th Kup. He receives a certificate and engraved trophy.

Alfie started Taekwon-Do at the very first lesson of the New Barnet school in 2004, at a very young age. Consistently since then, he has shown a great deal of dedication and concentration, which is good to see from a junior student.

His ability in Taekwon-Do has steadily increased over time and he is now perfoming at a level where he can confidently expect to come away with medals at any tournament he enters. In 2006 he picked up 2 Silver medals for sparring and patterns at his very first competition!

His patterns performance is good and his sparring is developing particularly well. Alfie has both talent and a great attitude to training and I expect him to continue to get better and better!

Very well done to him!

Congratulations to:

Chris McCarthy & Daniel McCarthy for passing to Green tag, 7th kup!

TKD Excel Competitors:

Under 13's Yellow Belt: Daniel McCarthy & Chris McCarthy.

This first ITF England Championship brought together all major associations in the UK with competitors from Ireland, Scotland, Wales as well as England. Several World And European Champions took part in the Black Belt competition. Masters Orello Ellis and Donato Nardizzi were present to oversee the proceedings.

Well done to Daniel McCarthy for Winning a Silver in Patterns and Gold in Sparring; and to Chris McCarthy for winning Silver in sparring!

It was unfortunate to have 2 brothers competing for Gold in the Sparring final, but as in previous tournaments this year, their mature and accomplished sparring performances attest to the quality training at the New Barnet school.

Taekwon-Do Excel New Barnet medallists Chris McCarthy and Daniel McCarthy

Congratulations to both teams from New Barnet.

Team 1 came away with bronze medals for both patterns and sparring competitions!

Team 1:

Ilja Titov (Captain)
Chris McCarthy
Daniel McCarthy

Team 2:

Kamil Clarke (Captain)
Alfie Huggard
Jonathan Quinzo

Targetting Twin-fist vertical punch

Two days of top class tuition from the ETA Technical Committee. 3rd Kups and below Saturday 11-2pm; 2nd kups and above Sunday 9am-12pm. A Black Belt grading also took place on the Sunday.

Photo calls with ETA President Master Ellis VIII degree. Mr T. Denis VI degree (left) Mr R. Adelagun III degree (right)

More details on the ETA website here

TKD Excel Competitors:

Adult Green Belt: Kevin Manktelow. Under 13's Yellow Belt: Ilja Titov, Daniel McCarthy, Chris McCarthy, Kamil Clarke, Jonathan Quinzo and Vijith Rajaratnam.The London Open is a major national event in the Taekwon-Do calendar and the New Barnet students were eager to meet the challenge!

This was by far the largest event that they had attended so far and they were looking to gain valuable experience and test themselves against opponents from many different organisations.

Patterns
The first event with New Barnet students taking part was the Under 13's Yellow Belt Patterns. All Excel students were in this same division out of a total number of at least 35. For any of them to get a medal in such a large group would be a real achievement. Kamil and Vijith went out in the first round in very close matches.

Jonathan, Chris, Daniel and Ilja all got through their first rounds with no trouble at all. It was beginning to look good for New Barnet to get into the medals. Then, in the quarter finals, Ilja was drawn against Daniel. This was a real shame because it meant that the loser would be just out of the medals. The decision was close but Daniel won with better stances and more precision. Ilja was happy for his teammate and bore no grudge!

Now things were getting exciting for New Barnet - 3 of us were in the semi-finals! Daniel was drawn against his brother Chris. Both did well but Chris won through with a unanimous decision from the judges. Jonathan was drawn against a girl who had had easy opponents up until him. After their first pattern, the judges could not decide on a winner and so they had to repeat it. Despite a little wobble near the end, Jonathan's superior power and sharpness took him into the final.

It was now between Jonathan and Chris for Gold and Silver. They both managed a very good performance of their pattern Dan-Gun with no mistakes or hesitations. Chris managed better stances and power in his techniques and the decision went to him with the judges voting 2-to-1 in his favour!

Taekwon-Do Excel New Barnet Patterns medallists Chris McCarthy(Gold), Jonathan Quinzo (Silver) & Daniel McCarthy (Bronze)

This was an amazing performance for New Barnet - for one school to go to such a big tournament and clean up Gold, Silver and Bronze in an event is unheard of. Once again, as in previous tournaments, New Barnet students are doing much better than the rest!

Kevin Manktelow was up later on in the Green Belt patterns. Whilst Kevin demonstrated good power and technical content in his pattern, his opponent was awarded the win. It is unfortunate that sometimes close decisions go to the pattern that appears better rather than to the one that is more technically correct.

SparringKevin Manktelow was up for New Barnet in the adult Male Green Belt under 75kg category. His first bout was difficult due to the aggression and speed of his opponent, but Kevin used good ringcraft and his greater reach to control him and win victory. There were only 4 people in his division and so his next fight was for Gold.

The final was against an opponent who was not an accomplished fighter and who only knew how to rush forward and swing his fists in an attempt to knock Kevin out. The referee did not control the bout to keep it at semi-contact level which is the AETF rule for sparring and so the crowd was treated to an unfortunate display of wild and unskilled swinging from the opponent versus the much more accomplished sparring of Kevin. Well done to Kevin for gaining Silver, keeping control of his sparring and using his intelligence in the ring.

Sparring Silver medallist Kevin Manktelow.

In the Under-13's Yellow and Green Belt sparring, New Barnet had 3 in the under 146cm division and 2 in the over 146 division. In the under 146cm group, Vijith won his first bout quite easily but then went out in the second round to a more experienced opponent.

Kamil also easily won his first two fights but was defeated in his third by a green belt. He received 2 highly dubious minus points in this fight which is the only reason it wasn't a draw.

Ilja had an absolutely sensational day! It took 5 fights to win him the Gold medal, and in each bout he utterly dominated the opposition. No opponent stood a chance against Ilja's overall excellence in sparring. The combination of his intelligence, movement and speed as well as his excellent choice of attacks and his good blocking meant that opponents had no idea what had hit them when the rounds started.

Ilja had seen his opponent for the final in earlier rounds and so knew how he was going to fight him. As good as he was, the opponent was only fighting with one technique, whereas Ilja has a range of offensive and defensive ability in the ring. Ilja scored with multiple fast punches, jumping punches and a beautifully executed reverse hooking kick. The blue-tag opponent had no idea of how to handle Ilja's varied attacks and excellent movement. Ilja easily took Gold with the best sparring I have ever seen from a junior colourbelt.

Sparring Gold medallist Ilja Titov and proud Instructor !

In the over 146cm division, Daniel was put out in the first round by an accomplished and very experienced green belt. Daniel demonstrated good ability in the ring but he did not quite produce enough in the way of high scoring attacks.

Chris won his first bout with ease, using very fast and accurate punching. He went out in the second round to a taller blue-tag who had a great deal more experience in his sparring. The over 146cm is a very tough division for a yellow belt and experience is the key. I am confident that it is only a matter of time before both Chris and Daniel will be dominant in their sparring divisions.

All in all, this was a great performance from the New Barnet students and shows that the training formula at the school is producing fantastic results!

Congratulations to:Kamil Clarke, Jonathan Quinzo and Ilja Titov for passing to Green Tag, 7th kup!Chris McCarthy, Daniel McCarthy and Vijith Rajaratnam, for passing to Yellow Belt, 8th kup!

Oliver Fletcher for passing to Yellow-tag, 9th kup!

TKD Excel Competitors: Ilja Titov, Alfie Huggard, Yoan Stoyanov, Daniel McCarthy, Chris McCarthy, Kamil Clarke and Vijith Rajaratnam.

Taekwon-Do Excel New Barnet medallists show off medals won during the Patterns competition!

Excellent performances from the New Barnet students won them each a medal in the Patterns events, including Gold for Vijith! Performances in sparring were also very good with Kamil winning Gold and Ilja and Alfie winning Silvers! Particularly impressive on the day was Alfie Huggard who won 2 Silvers in his first competition!

Relaxed and ready to do battle!

Time and again through the events, the New Barnet students beat more senior and more experienced opponents, meaning that they can only go on to even more success in future!A great demonstration of patterns and sparring was also performed by 3 members of the England team.

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Congratulations to:Steve Railton for passing to Green Belt, 6th kup!Lee Rouse, for passing to Yellow Belt, 8th kup!

Sajith Rajaratnum, Daniel McCarthy, Chris McCarthy, Jake Meggs and Alice Rudwick for passing to Yellow-tag, 9th kup!

Two excellent 3-hour seminars were conducted by the ETA Technical Committee over the weekend with a very high turnout of junior and senior grades! On the Saturday there were 52 red-tags and below and on the Sunday, 55 red and black belts were at Lyonsdown Hall in New Barnet to train under ITF England President Master Ellis - this included 6 members of the current England Taekwon-Do Team.The seminars paid close attention to important elements of technical detail in Taekwon-Do and the Technical Committee made sure to pay personal attention to each and every student during the sessions. The relaxed but highly focussed training was thoroughly enjoyed by the participants and the next set of seminars in 6 months time are already eagerly awaited!

Master Ellis (seated centre) with Mr Denis (left), Mr Symonds and additional senior instructors and students.

Group photo from the junior seminar

After the seminar on the Sunday, a Black Belt Grading was conducted by Master Ellis, Mr Denis 6th Degree and Mr Symonds 4th Degree. Congratulations to Mr Marc Fitzsimons, Mr Piotr Capaja, Mr Dan Farrell and Mr Rowland Adelagun for achieving 3rd Degree Black Belt and Miss Julie Fagg for achieving 2nd Degree!

Master Ellis covers the finer points of low block with England Team member Dan Farrell. Leading the class by example!