Stoke UTAs Taekwondo Triumphs
Asian Gold For Para Taekwondo Star Truesdale
Stoke UTAs Para Taekwondo superstar Amy Truesdale from Chester travelled with the GB Taekwondo team to compete in the 3rd Asian Para Taekwondo championships in Chuncheon in South Korea. Truesdale who is already world Taekwondo Champion and three times European Para gold medallist, was out to prove a point as she missed out on gold in the last Asian Paras in the Philippines !
This was one of the biggest para events to date and with WTF Para Taekwondos inclusion as an Olympic sport in Japan 2020 , it was important that Amy took valuable seeding and ranking points at this event !
This was Amy’s first competition since 2016 and with Amy training three days a week at the GB sport Taekwondo headquarters at Sport City Manchester, alongside double Olympian Jade Jones and double world champion Bianca Walkden, the expectation from her Stoke based coach Peter Johnson was high. Amy trains at Stoke when she can but is slowly being brought into the GB Squad with increased training for 2020.
Amy’s first match was into the semi-final against Sheetal Kumari from India , and Amy got to work and took a great and devastating win 24-0, showing her world class experience and taking her into the final against Guljonoy Naimova from Uzbekistan, an unknown relatively new fighter. Once again, Amy’s class and experience took its toll on the Uzbekistan fighter with Amy taking the win and the Asian open title 25-9 .
Coach Johnson Knew that Amy would produce. Additional training at GB Taekwondo will propel Amy into a different class with a great chance of gold in the 2020 Olympics in Japan !
Silver Service for Stoke Taekwondo Team
Stoke UTA Taekwondo competed in the Liverpool Open Taekwondo Championships over the weekend of 24/25 June and with a relatively new and inexperience team took three silver medal podium places with three new players!
With over two hundred participants, and the competition designated as a seeding competition for the National Championships in Manchester in September it was to be a hard and tough competition! Stoke fielded three new players young Nora Hastings from Sandbach in the Junior Novice girls section , Daryl Meir from Chell in the Senior men’s Novice section , and Craig Astbury from Stoke in the Senior men’s Veterans division all three just yellow belts in the sport !
First up was Nora Hastings going through to the final against a black belt from Scotland, Nora fought well and took the lead in the first round then the experience of the higher graded player showed through and Nora lost on a points decision but she fought hard right up to the last round !
Next up was Daryl from Chell in the Senior Novice Heavy weight division again Daryl went through to the final and came up against another Black belt, but fought hard in all three rounds and took another Silver medal for the club with a strong performance.
Last up Craig Astbury from Blythe Bridge going into the final against a tough competitor from Ireland in the Veterans section, Craig with a Kick boxing background fought well through all three rounds dominating the match and always on the offensive but deductions, but got a few points taken off for head punching which is not allowed in WTF taekwondo and this took him out of the gold medal position!
Coach, Peter Johnson, was pleased with this performance from his new team, It’s a big contrast we have Amy Truesdale from Stoke UTA fighting in Korea at the Asian Para Championships this week and we have our small team fighting in Liverpool, but it all counts and the team did great and for some it was their first outing in Taekwondo and bringing back three silver medals for our Club!
A great start and progression towards the Nationals at the Velodrome in Manchester in September!
For more information contact:
Peter Johnson
GB Para Taekwondo Coach
01782 281906
Peter.tkd.uta@btinternet,com