Colorado Martial Arts News

(Las Vegas, NV) – The senior divisions at the US Open Taekwondo championships featured an amazing level of competition. There were dozens of Olympians present as well as those trying to leave their mark on the sport of Taekwondo. Colorado had several athletes take part, and although none walked away with a medal, several sparred well and were able to get deep bracket penetration.

The largest division in the tournament was the men’s bantamweight. There were 95 competitors registered for this event. In a stroke of bad luck, Khusrav Giyosov (KAT- TJK) and Ahmed Alsubaihawi (KAT – IRQ) met in the first round. Master Bill Pottle remarked: “Seriously? Find me something in Vegas that has 94 to 1 odds and I will go bet on it.” Giyosov won the match and then in the next round he lost to a great competitor from Mexico. That competitor went all the way through the brackets and ended up getting bronze.

In the men’s welterweight division SirGregory Salonis (KAT – USA) faced against Mexico in the first round. They had a thrilling match that ended in a 10-10 tie. In overtime Salonis got the golden point to move on to the next round against Lenn Hypolite from Trinidad and Tobago. Hypolite won and defeated several other players to end the day with a silver medal. Farkhod Negmatov (KAT – TJK) won his first match against USA easily, and then fell against 2008 Olympic Bronze Medalist and world #1 Aaron Cook (Isle of Man).

In the Men’s Heavyweight division, Alisher Gulov (KAT – TJK) defeated USA in his first match and defeated USA National Team Member Phillip Yoon in his second match. In the quarterfinals he faced Anthony Obame, the 2012 Olympic Silver Medalist from Gabon. Gulov dominated the entire match and was leading throughout when he was disqualified with 1 minute left in the third round. The final penalty was a gam jeong for “Intentional Attack After Kayleo”. However, the referee was doubly wrong. First, she called Kayleo in the middle of an exchange, second, the attack was at the same time as Kayleo, and certainly not intentionally after. His kick is already in the air when she started to call Kayleo. It was a very unfortunate error. After the match Obame went on to win Gold.

In other action, Heather Gibson (Rock – USA) was leading Costa Rica throughout but lost a close match in the waning seconds. Something similar happened to Cameron Webster (JWK/Littleton – USA) who was winning but then lost his match in overtime.

All in all it was a great experience and showed that Colorado Taekwondo is at a level where they can go neck and neck with the world’s best!

You can see all the brackets on the official results page.

(Denver, CO) – Students from elementary and middle schools across Colorado competed at the 2013 Twin Dragons Tournament in order to earn points towards the Elementary Schools League Cup. Competition was fierce across the five events that award students points. Students earned 3 points for each first place finish, 2 points for each second place finish, and one point for each third place finish. In scored events (forms and breaking), students earned 0.5 points for each 4th or lower place finish. In bracketed events (sparring and grappling) if there are between 5 and 8 competitors, all students  who lose the first match earned third place points so that the way the bracket is drawn doesn’t affect the number of points awarded.

The Garcia family earned 7 points for GVA and created one super medal in their first tournament

There were 35 different schools who earned points during the 2012-2013 school year. Last year’s runner up Global Village Academy (Aurora) took the title this year. They had two significant advantages that made them very hard to beat. As the oldest afterschool program, they had more higher belts and were able to compete across a large number of divisions. Instructor Jacob Gallegos spoke to this point when he said “As with all things in life, with experience, comes victory.” They also had a number of students training in the KAT Aurora dojang, which allowed them to enter the most competitors of any afterschool program. Instructor Christina Seraile stated “I think I speak for every instructor who has ever taught at GVA when I say how proud we are of you and how far you have come in your discipline and technique. It’s really been a team effort by the kids, parents, and instructors.”

Last year’s winner Aurora Quest K8 put up a valiant showing, but in the end fell just short. The drama was heightened by a tie on the initial scores for demo team, which would have been a 10 point swing ( – 5 for GVA, + 5 for Quest) if the tiebreaker had gone the other way. Quest was hurt by scheduling conflicts in TDT as well as the Fall Championships, and will surely be a contender for the title again in 2013-2014.

Jibril had so many awards it took two Olympians just to lift him up.

Master Komil Latipov’s Crescent View Academy (CVA) looked dangerous throughout the day, and threatened to take the lead with strong performances in both sparring and grappling. However, they gave up significant points in forms and breaking and didn’t participate in demo, which left them unable to catch up with the larger teams. Still, Jibreal Jones (CVA) won the grand champion belt for overall medals in the tournament.

Sensei Melinda’s Greenwood Options (GWO) students entered the largest team, and won top honors in both breaking and forms. With 28.5 points, their breaking performance was the most dominant of any team in any event. However, having not participated in the Fall Championships, they were starting at a significant disadvantage. Still, they won 2nd at Twin Dragons and 4th overall, a very respectable finish.

High Point Academy (HPA) will certainly be disappointed to drop one spot to fifth, but they did well across many events. It is an honorable finish for a program that is only two years old and they will certainly come back strong next season.

Instructor Harrison’s Northridge Elementary earned their first league points and a 10th place overall finish

The Colorado Elementary Schools League has now had three events, each one becoming larger and more competitive than the last. Instructor Christina summed things up. “I’d like to commend ALL the schools and their instructors. You have done an amazing job to make the elementary school league as strong as it is.”

The league goes from Kindergarten to 8th Grade and welcomes students from any elementary/middle school. As with other sports, students compete for the academic school they attend, rather than the martial arts school where they hold rank. Teams interested in joining should comment on this post or contact any of the instructors mentioned in this article.

The League also awards the MVP Award for the student who earned the most points in the five league events (Sparring, Grappling, Breaking, Demo and Forms). Last year’s MVP was Riley Ward (QST). This year the top honor went to Isabella Walsh (GVA) with 18 points, followed by Taylor Altman (GVA) with 16 points and Jibreal Jones (CVA) with 15 points. Let’s give a big “Chook Ha Hahm Nida” to these well rounded martial artists!

The final results for the 2012-2013 League Year are posted below.

(Las Vegas, NV) – Colorado students from many different Taekwondo schools converged on Las Vegas to participate in the US Open Taekwondo championships. The event drew 2700 black belt competitors from 75 countries, including 33 of the London Olympians. The level  and difficulty of the event have caused some in the media to say that the US Open should be upgraded to a G3 Level Event, as seen in this full coverage of the results.

Tuesday featured Poomsae competition. The highlight of the day was Master Steve Humphries (Golden Family TKD) who earned silver in his division. Other forms competitors included Dale Zamora (KAT) who placed 21st/23, Angela Olivera (CTA) who placed 10th, Jeremiah Moran-Fairchild who made it to the semifinals our of 54, Nikita Karamian (CTA) who got 16th/51, Alexis Menjares (CTA) took 18th/55. The field was extremely difficult. A former US Poomase Team member remarked “Basically, if you didn’t have a vertical side kick you weren’t even thinking about the medals.” One of the great things about Poomsae competition is that different competitors can perform together in a way not allowed by sparring competition. This video (by M-Team) shows many different teams doing Koryo in the warm up area and gives a good idea of the level of Poomsae competition.

Wednesday featured the 10-11, 12-14, and 33+ sparring divisions. In the 40-50 Welterweight division, Master Ghassan Timani (KAT)  inspired many people by returning to tournament competition after 20 years. He received a tough draw, losing 3-0 to the eventual gold medalist from Germany in the first round. LaRon Younger (KAT) defeated Norway 12-2 in his first match, highlighted by a much talked about butterfly kick to the face. He defeated USA in his second match, losing only to USA in the finals. He ended with a well-deserved silver medal. Melchor Moran (CTA) earned a bronze medal in sparring, defeating his first two opponents but losing his third match. Jeremiah Moran-Fairchild (CTA) lost his first match but did a great job. Isaac Vigil (MYT) won his first two matches, before falling in the semifinals to the eventual gold medalist. He ended up with a bronze medal. Kaitlin Grenning (Golden TKD) defeated PA in her first match, which also earned her a bronze medal.

Wednesday featured four gold medals for Colorado. Angela DeOlivera (CTA) won gold after defeating another competitor from the USA. Madelin Gorman-Shore (The Rock) defeated four Americans in order to claim the 12-14 year old heavyweight division. Grace Kosloski (KAT) defeated four opponents including Mexico, having to come from behind in the final seconds of the final match against Canada in order to clinch gold. Her brother Josh Kosloski (KAT) showed tremendous heart, coming in to the tournament less than 100% and needing to win five matches to clinch gold. He had to overcome many close matches, including sudden death, to be the 2013 US Open Champion. Master Komiljon Latipov said “They represented Colorado and KAT very well and made me so proud! Can’t wait to teach them new things.” 9 News did a story on the siblings’ victory.

All in all it was a great experience for Colorado athletes to be among the best in the world. Although forms ended with only one silver medal, on Wednesday Colorado earned 4 golds, 1 silver, and 3 bronzes. Stay tuned to Colorado Martial Arts News for coverage of the main event – the Adult divisions on Thursday and Friday!

Full results including all brackets are available on USA Taekwondo’s Website. All videos can be seen at the USAT Dartfish channel, for $15 per day of competition.

If any Colorado athletes aren’t included or if any results aren’t correct, please comment below and we will edit the story.