Taekwon-Do: First NZ ITF championships since Covid bring in more than 200 competitors

Kade Nukunuku- Rota, of Tamatea Primary School in action, at NZ ITF Taekwon-Do Championships. Photo / Warren Buckland

More than 200 Taekwon-Do competitors representing 16 schools from across the North Island gathered at Hastings Sports Park this month to compete in the New Zealand ITF Championships.

Coach and ITF Hawke’s Bay president Ben Evans explained ITF stands for International Taekwon-Do Federation, and while they have regular competitions throughout the year, this was the organisation’s “big 2023 championships.”

The 2023 championships, as well as being the first NZ ITF Championships since Covid-19 struck, was the first time the Hawke’s Bay organisation could bring both special needs competitors and mainstream competitors together in a tournament setting.

Evans said the day of the championships was very, very busy, and although he had all the electronic scoring sorted the night before the event, he came in and found that two out of the three rings were having technical difficulties.

Coach and ITF Hawke’s Bay president Ben Evans said the event went well and thanked all the volunteers for their support and help. Photo / Warren Buckland

However with the team events up first, Evans had time to get the scoring systems on the outer two rings working while everyone else was watching the team patterns and team sparring events.

After all the technical issues were fixed, the well-organised day ran without a hitch.

The Hawke’s Bay NZ ITF president has been planning this event since the start of the year and said he was excited to see it all finally come together.

With 200-plus people at the event, there was a lot of scoring to calculate, however, the top overall school at the NZ ITF Championships was Tamatea Primary School.

Evans said the school’s teams did really well. “Their boy’s team sparring won gold, the school’s junior team won boys and girls bronze in team patterns, they did really well in terms of that side.”

Tamatea Primary School Kade Nukunuku- Rota’s winning streak helps his school win overall at the NZ ITF Taekwon-Do Championships.

Kirstin Yule, mother of two girls competing in the championships said: “It was really well-run, we thoroughly enjoyed the event.”

This year was the first championships for Yule’s daughters, aged 5 and 13, after they took up Taekwon-Do less than eight months ago.

The two girls had a great first championship with Yule’s 5-year-old winning three golds and her 13-year-old taking home a gold and two silvers.

“To be able to achieve those levels of awards at their first competition is just kudos to their trainer, and the girls for putting in the time and effort,” Yule said.

As a parent, Yule said she does push her kids to attend as many lessons as possible, however in the end it really is up to them if they want to go or not.

Right now Yule’s 13-year-old trains for a minimum of 15 hours a week and her 5-year-old trains for around five hours a week.

“So it also is kudos to the kids as well, as they have definitely put in the hard work,” said the proud mum.