Index
	Foreword from Grandmaster Loke
	Championship Report by Jonathan King (1st Duan)
	Results & Awards
	Articles:
	Croydon Club's Championships
	Epsom Club, post Championships gathering
	Photographs:
	Ji Grade Thau / Form events
	Duan Grade Thau / Form events
	Girls & Ladies Ji Grade Tooi Ta / Free-Sparring events
	Boys Ji Grade Tooi Ta / Free-Sparring events
	Mens Ji Grade Tooi Ta / Free-Sparring events
	Duan Grade Tooi Ta / Free-Sparring events
	Other photographs taken during the day
	Presentation of Awards
	Demonstrations
	Note: Pages containing photographs may take time to load. If you are using a regular modem (not broadband) and all photographs do not load on your page, just hit the F5 key to load the remaining photographs, thank you.

 

Foreword from Grandmaster Loke

I am very proud to announce that our 2006 National Championships on the 17th June was a resounding success. Judges, referees and officials discharged their duties admirably and many competed as well after working tirelessly all day. It is heartening to see many new 1st Duan and 1st Ji taking up their posts as ringside judges and officials. Well Done!

Our Championship is an annual celebration of our martial art family to meet socially and applaud each other's technical progress. More importantly, it is to display "wu dao" the "way of the martial artist", with sincerity and self control. We strive to keep injuries to a minimum and demonstrate maturity and respect for each other. To compete keenly as well as maintaining self control is a great achievement. The Way of the martial artist is to achieve this balance in line with our Seven Principles, not only in physical combat, but also in the decisions and actions we need to take in our daily lives.

Master Adam Goward and his instructors and students deserve our special commendation for hosting our prestigious event in Haywards Heath. This year I am delighted to announce the promotion of Master Goward to Liu 6th Duan to mark his continued full time dedication, technical maturity and promotion of our Ren Yi Wu Kwan in the Kent, Surrey and Sussex areas. Some sixteen years ago he had to commute daily (for two years) after a full day's work from his home in Benfleet, Essex, to sow the first seeds in Epsom and Horsham. It is a very rare privilege for me to come across such a fully determined and loyal student who has the ambition and vision to be a full time Ren Yi Wu Kwan instructor from such a young age. This "Way" requires great sacrifice and we admire his success and the popularity he enjoys from his students; some have moved on to be instructors! I hope he can inspire others to build yet more strong branches to our martial art family tree.

This year also sees the promotion of Mr Jeff Thomas and Mr Nazim Gokcezade to Master "Shi Fu" Ser Duan level. Mr Thomas celebrated his sixtieth birthday very recently, he trains and teaches three to four times weekly and is always on hand to contribute in any way possible to the furtherance of the Ren Yi Wu Kwan. A great role model to everyone, Mr Gokcezade has steadfastly held our Reading Wu Kwan successfully for many years, four classes weekly on top of a demanding full time job. The discipline and support of his students to our championships reflect on his teaching ability and dedication. We also commend both their families who participate and give moral support.

The change from a Duan rank instructor to Shi Fu level is reflected in the two Chinese words - "shi" meaning "teacher" and "fu" meaning "father or parent" eloquently reflecting the deepening relationship between the more experienced teacher and their pupils. This can only be achieved through one's dedicated involvement in both teaching and training over many years and the degree of respect and deference shown by lower grades. To date I have conferred the title Shi Fu to fifteen instructors over our schools' thirty- three year history. I hope more will follow in the future.

In fond memory of our school's first "Shi Siong" Bill who passed away in 1988, we have a very deserving winner to receive the Bill Edwards Memorial Award for the Most Outstanding Student for 2006. David Morris, 1st Duan, attends classes four times per week and is always present to assist his juniors to the best of his ability. He is indeed a fine well-mannered example to his age group. A much-valued asset, particularly given today's increasing violent youth culture.

My founding of the Ren Yi Wu Kwan in 1997 has been a long fulfilled ambition resulting from an incurable martial art addiction since childhood and I look forward to many more years of further development and expansion of our martial art family. In spite of our ever increasing busy lives at home, work and school, I thank you all for your continued loyalty, support and dedication.

TANG SOU!

Grandmaster Loke
Founder

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Championship Report:

THE DAY THE TEA URN FOUGHT BACK!
by Jonathan King (1st Duan) Epsom

Saturday June 17th dawned bright and at 5.30 a.m. the alarm went off. Blearily opening one eye it dawned on me that the day had finally come, the day of the Championships. Then the nerves kicked in, could I remember my forms? Who was I going to be sparring against? Was I going to be able to act as a good and fair official and, most importantly, was the tea urn going to work?! It was my responsibility to make sure it did, to refresh all those thirsty referees and officials of the 14th National Tang Sou Dau Championship. This year it was held in the leafy surroundings of the Dolphin Leisure Centre in Haywards Heath, West Sussex and it was my first Championships as a 1st duan black belt. With this sense of responsibility, along with the nerves, whilst making a cup of early morning tea I thought that I should just run through Ping An Form five and Lou Han form two in my pyjamas in the kitchen, I can only imagine what the neighbours thought!

With sandwiches, fruit and plenty of water packed for the day my son, Simon (2nd duan) and I set off round the M25 and down the M23 and arrived at the Dolphin Leisure Centre nice and early. It was gong to be a scorcher with the English summer heat already starting to permeate the air. A few other early arrivals were also there and were busy practising their forms and a few sparring moves in the car park against imaginary opposition. Getting myself changed into my uniform, the nerves really started to kick in - where was the tea urn? Master Goward had asked me to be responsible for the tea urn and it was no where to be found! Entering the Main Hall, a sense of familiarity arrived. This was my fourth Championships and it was amazing how the years had flown by. The hall looked ready for the day, the banked rows of spectator seating, the top table, impressively laid out with the medals and trophies for the day, the competition sheets stuck on the wall ready for the expectant competitors to find out their destiny. I found a small store cupboard through a door off the main hall and there it was glinting in the morning sun, the tea urn…!

More and more people started to arrive with the clamour and expectant buzz of excitement as competitors picked up their numbers from Mrs Loke at the front desk, nervously trying to pin the numbers to their uniforms. The usual crush developed around the competition sheets with anxious parents noting down the times and ring numbers for their children's exploits during the day. Everywhere there was a real sense of anticipation for the events of the day. Back to my duties; I had got the tea urn filled and set up on a trestle table in the officials' refreshment room, plugged it into the wall expecting the red light to provide a comforting glow, but disaster, no red light, the socket had died! Panic set in, how was I going to explain this to thirsty and gasping black belts desperate for their first cup of the day? Master Goward came to the rescue, having thought that this might happen he produced his industrial strength extension lead with about 50 metres of cable! I found another plug and set it all up turned it on and thank goodness, the red light came on; surely now it would behave and boil the water to provide hot drinks for everyone? I left the tea urn, hoping that everything would be OK and went back to the Main Hall to be called for the line up.

I felt a real sense of responsibility lining up for the first time in the front row with my other black belt colleagues. There was a lot of hand shaking as people from different clubs recognised each other and reacquainted themselves again. Called to attention, proceedings were rudely and annoyingly interrupted by a crossed line on the public address system and we seemed to be picking up someone's mobile telephone conversation and meant that the encouraging words from Grandmaster Loke were lost against the background of inane chat. Master Goward came to the rescue again and quickly pulled the plug on the P.A. loudspeaker so that we could get started. Having done a few warm up exercises we set about the annual event that is 'The Group Photograph'. Fifteen minutes or so later, all the competitors were standing shoulder to shoulder on the banked spectator seating. Grandmaster Loke and Master Goward sorted us all out to ensure that everyone was facing front and could be seen. Smaller people were moved to the front and larger ones were moved back. Finally everything was in place and the flash bulbs went off as proud parents took photographs of us all. Photographer Mr Evagorou senior was in charge this year and took a large number of shots. Once this had been completed, the officials were all called for instructions by Grandmaster Loke.

But what about the tea urn? A quick check of the refreshments room, and disaster yet again, the thing hadn't boiled. Why was this metal object fighting me? I was going to have enough competition later in the day in the veterans' section of the competition. But why now? A check of the electrics showed that everything was working but the cut out on the extension lead kept kicking in and meant that I had to keep visiting the room to reset the button.

Back out into the Main Hall and I was an official in ring nine for the forms competition. The first job was to collect the scoring sheets and organise the competitors. Our three judges had arrived and were sitting opposite the officials table clutching their scoring files in eager anticipation for the competition. We had three sections to organise and there was an expectant buzz around the ring as the first set of youngsters was called forward for their forms. I could see parents mentally urging their offspring on, doing some of the moves for them and then a great sense of relief when they had finished. My job was to do some very quick mental mathematics, what are seven and a half plus seven plus six and a half? Twenty one, thank goodness, this was a real test of concentration and brain power, marking down the scores, making sure that everything was correct and we had our winner and second and third places. This year medals were handed out to the proud recipients at the end of each round. This worked well and meant that time flashed past.

Suddenly it was my turn to compete, nervously lining up with my other veteran compatriots, entering the ring first, but could I remember every move? Then it was finished, I had done my best, but it was not quite good enough and when I saw the others I knew that it wasn't going to be my year for a medal. I could only sit back and marvel at the moves that our winner Michael Ridout made, a deserved result with clean crisp and powerful moves for Lou Han three and Ping An Five. All too quickly it was over and this gave me a chance to watch some of the other black belts competing. The elegance of Tina Matania, our instructor from Epsom, the rugged power and control of Nick Evagorou who scored a nine from one judge and both were winners in their sections. How was Simon, my son, doing? A bronze, with an excellent Lou Han form four and a good Ping An form five. He was delighted and proudly showed his medal for a photograph for the album. How had the rest of our club, from Epsom, performed? Overall, there were some good results with everyone generally happy with their performance.

Back to check on the tea urn, and finally after hours of waiting and pressing the 'on' button it had finally produced some lukewarm water for tea and coffee. But as the weather was so warm there were not many takers, with officials preferring the bottled water and I can't blame them!

To the ji grade's sparring competition, and my duties this time were in ring five with Master Ronketti as the senior referee. Having sorted out the paperwork we were off, with some excellent performances and good spirit from all those competing. We only had a couple of injuries which, given the strong performances, was very creditable. After some soothing words, a quick wipe of the tears away with a tissue, and a few sips of water these competitors were ready for the fray again.

It was then my turn for my event, and I lined up in the 1st duan and 1st duan Senior Veterans (am I really that old?) competition. It all went in a blur, getting through to the final where I was fighting Ian Holditch. After a cagey start both of us scoring points but not exerting ourselves too much, (due to our age!) I managed to nudge ahead. With the clock running down I was caught with a front thrust kick to my midriff and the points were level again. After circling each other and feigning left and right, I managed to push forward with a couple of well timed punches to the body and chest of my opponent. The referee's whistle blew had I scored? Yes, no time left surely? But off we went again and then the reassuring beep of the timing clock. I had done it, winning the competition at my first attempt in the veterans, but it was close with a lot of deep breaths required to try and catch some well needed air back into my lungs. The announcements were made and I was delighted to have won a very tight and close competition. Simon, too had done well getting another bronze medal in his sparring competition.

Then another line up, followed by the demonstrations starting with some impressive short range hand and kicking techniques to break tiles and breeze blocks. The team from Croydon gave a hugely effective display of self-defensive moves to the music from the film Gladiator. After another superb display of one step sparring with some amazing scissor kick take-downs, it was Simon and Tina's turn. With Simon 'booted and suited' in body protection, the display of self defence moves for a woman, by Tina, against a male attacker was very effective. Then it was Master Siew Ying Loke's turn to show her slow kicking skills, silence descended as the seemingly impossible moves were carried out with beautiful precision and timing - another superb demonstration.

Finally, the medal ceremony for the free fighting competition rounded off a very tiring, but deeply satisfying, and enjoyable day.

And the tea urn finally behaved……

Jonathan King (1st Duan) Epsom

(and budding writer…..)

 

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