First United Taekwondo Club Board Breaking competition
~~Adz:Right~~Basseterre; St. Kitts - On Saturday 29th November 2008 saw the First United Taekwondo Club (UTC) Gyok Pah (Board Breaking) competition by the Saddler Dojang. The spectacular event took place at the Saddlers Primary School; the event started at about 5:00 pm after comments from the Principal of Saddlers Primary School Mrs. Marvah Bradshaw and the Taekwondo Master Instructors Lincoln and Lyndon David and then the athletes were introduced to the eagerly awaited audience. Once the competition got underway, it was action, excitement, fun, shouts, cheers and lots of applause.
From start to finish hands flew like fighter jets, smashing through the boards, which then flew through the air like rockets; the supporting concrete blocks shaking like earthquake passing or a volcanic eruption. Present were new students from the Saddlers United Taekwondo Club (Dojang), two students from St. Paul’s Dojang, three students from Basseterre Dojang and one student from Sandy oint Dojang who did demonstrations. This Dojang started in February 2008 and therefore, we are very pleased that the students/athletes were allowed to participate in this action packed event and for this we say thank you to the parents and even the Principal who is very supportive of the dojang and the students.
The participants were placed in divisions according to age and they demonstrated that came well prepared to win. This made the event even more exciting and explosive as the expectations rose as to who will break all the board presented to be broken. The divisions started from 6 to 8 years olds, whoever, this division only had girls and performed very well with their thunderous breaking techniques. The participants were so highly energised and excited that in two of the ladies’ divisions had ties and this even brought more expectations and excitement from the large turn out of ladies in the audience. However, in the final analysis the ladies were the one who were in the spot light as in the 11 to 12 years old girls division they were all tied on the first attempt with 5 pieces broke out of 9 pieces. However, on the second attempt the excitement grew as they started to demonstrate who wanted to win more and one broke 8 of the 9 to clench the gold while the closest person broke 6 pieces to win silver. This made the audience cheer and applauded loud and with excitement.
The Taekwondo Masters Lincoln and Lyndon David, and other senior students from UTC other Dojangs also added even more excitement to the nearly two-hour long event by breaking boards with their flying techniques and power breaks. Master Lyndon David jumped over 3 persons and break a piece of board with side kick and also demolished 9 pieces of board. Master Lincoln David on his part ran on the hands of a senior student while he had them extended in the air and broke a piece of board and then he broke two 2 inches blocks with his hand. Even members of the audience took part in the action by exhibiting their board breaking techniques. The mothers were the stars as most of the parents participating were ladies. Some of them broke up to 5 pieces of boards. One of the fathers in the audience attempted to break 11 pieces but only broke 7 pieces and he also demonstrated his Yoga techniques by stretching his leg while standing and more. Senior students Rovin Dore jumped over 5 persons and broke a piece of board, Kizan David jumped over 4 persons and broke a piece of board, Cristian Palanco broke 6 pieces of board using the knife hand chop, Hachianna Robin broke 5 pieces of boards with the palm heel strike.
The event was well attended by parents, family members and supporters of Taekwondo and the students. Some of the business places that assisted in this event that we would like to say special thanks to are TDC Home and Office Depot; Hardware section and Fraites and Sons Enterprises in Molyneaux.
We would like to use this medium to say a big thank you to all the parents, the Peace Corp members Ed Marinez and Georgia Triplett in the Belle Vue and Saddlers area, Mrs. Marvah Bradshaw Principal of Saddler’s Primary School, our senior students who participated and the businesses who partnered with us in this venture. Special thanks go out to the entire Saddlers community for embracing the UTC in their area.
