A thrilling competition - ITA Munster Open 2020 in Waterford

This year the ITA Munster Open took place in the fabulous WIT Arena in Waterford. The location is ideal and the venue is state of the art with a large, atmospheric arena for the competition area, comfortable seating for spectators and excellent restaurant and coffee facilities.

The competition was organised very efficiently with a smooth running order and a timetable which indicates what time your categories will run at. IFSC Force was well-represented with 5 competitors, and the club was very successful taking a grand total of 4 Gold, 3 Silver and 4 Bronze medals.

Deirdre took gold in senior female Red/Blue special technique with an impressive flying side kick securing her the victory. She also won the Senior female Patterns and sparring securing her an impressive three gold medals. Her sparring against a heavier opponent was really classy: she scored some beautiful techniques including downward kicks, back reverse turning kick, and strong punches and turning kicks. An exciting future awaits her as she prepares to enter the black belt category in the near future!

Soukeina took bronze in sparring with a good performance against someone a lot heavier. Soukeina moved well, and counter-fought her opponent, scoring with nice straight punches and some long kicks, unfortunately narrowly losing 2 -1. Soukeina also took silver in patterns with a solid display of Yul gok only losing out to Deirdre in the final.

The Blue/Red veteran category was a very large and high standard division with IFSC securing gold and silver in Patterns. Shirley had an improved and impressive dynamic patterns performance winning two rounds to get to the final which she lost narrowly to her club mate and friend Cathy in an all IFSC Force final. Cathy won three rounds performing a very sharp Hwa Rang to secure her a well-deserved gold.

In sparring, Shirley took silver winning her first fight in style to get to the final. Cathy took bronze losing in the semi-final to the eventual winner after fighting quite well.

John took bronze in 3rd degree + patterns division with a solid performance, and also took bronze in the minus 78kg Senior male Black belt sparring group, losing out to eventual winner Brendan Kenny in a very close semi-final fight.

IFSC did not stop here, however! After all competitors were finished, John went on to coach Sam Keogh from Master Douglas schools MDTS who was fighting in the Junior Male -75 KG division. Cheered on by his friends from IFSC, Sam fought amazingly, winning three fights in a dominant performance against some tough opposition to finish a day on a high.

We must say thank you to Master Buckley and the ITA for an excellent competition. Also thanks to Michael for umpiring as always for us. We appreciate the support Michael as competitions cannot run without experienced umpires. And most important, special thanks to Lenka for coaching all our club members to produce excellent performances and results.