Karate Kids and Adults win at event held in México

The House of Shotokan Karate Academy was victorious in a tournament against Mexico at the Belize Elementary School Auditorium last week. And this past weekend, there was a rematch but this time on Mexican soil.  The Belizean delegation was not deterred and beat the Mexicans on their own turf. Twenty-four fighters, ranging from age four to fifty six, competed at the Palacio De Los Deportes in Chetumal and brought back at least thirty medals, making history for the local athletes. The academy shined in all the categories. Shihan Ray Kelly, the grandmaster, spoke to News Five about their success and the fighters that stood out in the competition.

Shihan Ray Kelly, Grandmaster, House of Shotokan Karate Academy

Shihan Ray Kelly

“The crowd came alive when our four year old, Nathan Sharp, who attends Belize Elementary School—his mom is assistant vice principal—came alive when he went out there and he was fighting someone who is a lot bigger than him. And he kicked and punched his way into wining first place in his category. And also we had two outstanding other performances; one was by Kenisha Hulse. At the beginning she got kicked hard in the face, a little blood dripped, she cried and came over. I coached her and said get back in there and fight, you’re in Mexico, suck it up. And she went and she did a phenomenal job against the fighter. She was awarded first place in her division. The crowd came to their feet when they saw Alani Smith, our six year old. She fought her heart out; kicked and punched her opponent to the floor. He got back up, she punched him down again and it was exciting.

The categories we had was form competition, which is Kata. In the form competition we won about fifteen gold medals and three silver. That ranged from the four years olds doing their event all the way up to the adults. Jackie Liu, we call him Jackie Chan here at the dojo. He did a phenomenal job, he’s one of our brown belts here. He was recognized as one of the more highlighted Kata competitors along with one of our purple belts, Jordan Fuller, here in our school. And he did an outstanding job. On the fighting, there was different age categories in the fighting. And in the fighting division that was where we really put our best foot forward and did a phenomenal job of cleaning up, as I said, in excess of thirty medals. It’s the result of constant training, hard training here at the House of Shotokan and the discipline that the children and the adult students demonstrated that day before their foreign competitors.”

The House of Shotokan Karate Academy is now working towards having a team from the U.S. in Belize to challenge their Elite fighters. Two black belts from the academy are also training for a world championship tournament which will be held in Las Vegas this summer.