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May 2011
The Athletics Union Awards Dinner was held on the 06/05 at the Palace Hotel; this dinner rewards clubs and athletes for their performance throughout the academic year.
After the success of the team at BUCS, the KUGB Student Nationals and the KUGB Kyu Grades, our karatekas have been rewarded for all their hard work. Mel Finlay, Alex Simon, Cristina Finta, Kiki Pericas-Hewitt, Camille Sandaldjian, Brian Kanyanga, Dan Walters, Prawira Saldin, Kyriakos Solomou and Joe Hart were all awarded the Full-Performance Colours for their outstanding performance at BUCS. Camille also won a Double-Stripe award for her work as club captain.
The club also won three special awards out of the four it was short-listed in: our sensei won the "Coach of the Year" award for the second time in his career, recognising his fantastic work and level of commitment. Cristina came back with the "Sportswoman of the Year" award for her impressive success in this year's competitions. And finally the club won the "Most Improved Club of the Year" award, in particular for its success at BUCS (13 points in 2009/2010 vs. 89 points in 2010/2011).
Congratulations to all the awardees, you have made the University and your club proud!
April 2011
On 19th and 20th March, the club sent eleven competitors to the BUCS Championships held in Sheffield. On Saturday our Team Kata (Melissa Finlay, Cristina Finta and Alexandra Simon) did incredibly well by winning the Gold against Edinburgh, claiming the title held by Brunel for two consecutive years. Cristina obtained the Bronze in Women's Senior Kata, whilst Camille Sandaldjian got the Gold the Women's Intermediate Kata. Both the Men's Team (Daniel Walters, Brian Kanyanga, Joe Hart, Kyriakos Solomou, Prawira Saldin and Michael Pearce) and Women's Team (Alexandra, Melissa, Cristina and Camille) claimed the Bronze medal in Team Kumite after some fierce fighting, both losing to the gold medalists.
The results for individual fighting events held on Sunday lived up to this successful start, bringing five more titles to the University. Brian (Men's Senior U75kg), Cristina (Women's Senior U55kg) and Camille (Women's Senior U61kg) claimed the Bronze. Erica "Kiki" Pericas-Hewitt displayed some impressive fighting skills in the Women's Novice U57kg despite this being her very first competition, won the Silver medal. Alexandra brought back the Gold medal of the day by winning in the Women's Senior U68kg after a rather bloody, extremely well fought final. You go girl! The icing on the cake comes from our second place at the overall team ranking which is usually dominated by Bath, Brunel and Edinburgh. This achievement is even more impressive considering Edinburgh beat us by one gold medal only, with a team twice as big as ours. Let us not forget the amazing support and coaching provided by our Sensei Garry Harford and our squad mates Tom Thatcher and Emma Wilding, without who none of this would have been possible.
Eleven competitors, ten titles, a total of nineteen medals, 89 BUCS points awarded to the University, the Manchester University Karate Club has never done better at BUCS before. Well done to all our competitors for this incredible week-end; you have done your University, your Club and your Sensei proud.
May 2010
We have had an incredibly busy May month this year! In short, a great success at the KUGB Nationals and a couple of prizes at the AU Awards dinner.
On 15th May the 44th KUGB Nationals were held in Birmingham; the club sent a team with strong hopes for medals. The final results are rather impressive for a team of 8! Both our men (Dean Field, Stuart Gordon, Jakub Kristl) and women's team (Vicky Philips, Gemma Robinson, Camille Sandaldjian and Rosie Lau) won bronze after hard fought semi-finals. In the Female Senior Kumite, Vicky s came 3rd; Deanwon the silver in the Male Senior Kumite. In the Male Kata, Dean came 4th and Vicky did very well by winning the silver medal in the Female Kata. And last but not least, the kata's team composed of Vicky, Dean and Stuart won gold for the second year in a row. Congratulations to everyone, you have done us really proud!
On 14th May, a small delegation went to the AU Awards dinner held at the Palace Hotel; Laura Hitchen, Kyriakos Solomou and Jakub Kristl were running up for the Full Performance Colour award for outstanding performance throughout the year, whilst Martin Jackson and Camille Sandaldjian were running up for the Single Stripe award for their work as committee members. Our sensei Garry Harford was one of the three short listed for the Coach of the Year award. All five students won their awards, but sadly the Coach of the Year title was not awarded to Garry. We will be back next year for more!
March 2009
On 14th and 15th March, the club sent a small team to compete in the BUCS Championships.
On Saturday the women's team, consisting of Rachel Anthony, Camille Sandaldjian and Laura Hitchen, did incredibly well to win silver in the team kumite, defeating Liverpool, Edinburgh, Swansea and Cambridge along the way. They narrowly missed out on the gold in a hard-fought final against the University of London.
Their achievement is even more impressive when you consider that the Manchester team had two novice grades (4th kyu and below), and they were competing against teams that were mostly black belts.
On Sunday the girls continued their success in the individual kumite. Camille won gold in the novice category, despite this being her very first competition and suffering through an injury. Laura won silver in the seniors (3rd kyu and above) and was very unlucky not to take the gold.
Congratulations to our medalists, you have done the club proud!
December 2008
The club held its first grading of the academic year on Friday 12th December. It was a great success with all students passing.
