New Zealand Champs and Seminar
The 2016 United ITF New Zealand National Championships were held in Wellington, New Zealand on Saturday 11th June.
The following day saw Master Michael Muleta conduct a Seminar and Degree Testing for United ITF NZ and United ITF Australia Black Belts.
The National Champs saw participants travel from Across New Zealand, including Wellington and the South Island as well as a large contingent from Australian areas including Melbourne, Geelong, Mildura and Millicent.
Thoroughbred Taekwon-Do was represented by Master Michael Muleta, as an offical with Justin Chin and Anna Blake as competitors.
The competition featured a range of competitors from young first-timers through to past and present (and possibly future) International Taekwon-Do Federation World Champs. With some high quality contests the crowd were treated to a very entertaining day indeed.
From our club’s point of view, we had some very good results with Anna Blake taking out the best over all Junior Female award, winning her sparring and patterns convincingly, which will serve as valuable preparation for the upcoming ITF World Championships in England next month.
Justin Chin also continued his strong form, winning a silver medal in senior black belt patterns in a very high standard final against Kye Todd, with both in the national team for next month’s international event.
On the Sunday, Master Michael Muleta conducted a seminar including work on technical content, movement dynamics, kicking drills and some motivational and philosophical content. The session was well received and students preparing for the upcoming degree testing received some valuable last minute pointers.
The degree testing was quite involved and ultimately saw the promotion of Mark Elliot (3rd Degree), Kylee Cusin (3rd Degree) and Conner Melaugh (2nd Degree).
The Championships will be held as a biennial event with New Zealand supporting Master Muleta’s Australian events in the alternate years.
