Masterton judo fighters win brown belts

Masterton Judo and Ju Jitsu Academy head instructor Simon Ogden with Vinnie Morris (left) and George Robinson, who were awarded brown belts in judo. PHOTO/NATHAN CROMBIE

New grades and medals have been won over the past several weeks at the Masterton Judo and Ju Jitsu Academy.

Head instructor Simon Ogden said two students were the first at the academy to be awarded brown belts. They were Vinnie Morris and George Robinson, at a grading session at the Masterton dojo in Queen St on the weekend.

Ogden said the successes of the Masterton judoka in grading and competition also reflected the skill and commitment of academy judo coaches Graham Rogers and Daniel Chu, and Bevan Mackenzie at Wai Weight Private Gymnasium in Masterton where many of the fighters, including himself, were training for strength, stamina and fitness.

"At the end of the day, it's about turning up, putting in the hard yards and time on the mat, and the new gradings were well earned."

He said both fighters had been training for the past five years, with Morris also a brown belt in Shorinji Kan Ju Jitsu.

Four other blue belt judoka from the academy had attempted to grade at the same session although they had failed in their assessments for kata, which involved detailed patterns of movement demonstrated in pairs.

Ogden said there were seven candidates for brown belt grading with one fighter failing to attend and two fighters, Katia Mackenzie and Sam Clegg, deferred to the next kata course, when they will be re-assessed.

"The other two will have to sit the next exam. But it's now a known quantity.

"It's always a difficult thing to show something on the day and the panel only gets a snapshot of their skill levels."

"It's now over to them to move on from and again, there's no real failure.

"To be honest, you learn more from your attempts than you do from your successes. Especially when you're involved in a sport like judo that is so long term. It's very much about just keeping on. Falling down seven times and getting up eight."

Judoka from the academy had also taken a clean sweep of medals at the Wellington Open Championship kata competition at Kapiti College in mid-April. Katia Mackenzie and Robinson took bronze, Morris and Ogden taking silver and Clegg and Jayden Mackenzie taking gold.

Clegg also took a bronze medal in the senior boys under 55kg class at the North Wellington Judo Championships held at Wanganui High School on May 7 and 8. Judoka from the Masterton academy will also compete at the North Island Judo Championships in September, he said.