Karate kids: Kingston teens journey to national tournament

Posted Feb 16, 2012 By Hollie Pratt-Campbell

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EMC Sports - Three Kingston boys will represent not only their hometown but also all of Ontario this March break, when they travel to Richmond, BC for the National Karate Championships.

Black belts Justin Kellermann-Thompson, 15, Peter Mills, 16, and Cosme-Aiden Sommier, also 16, train at the local dojo SMA Karate, they qualified for the national championships by ranking the highest at four Karate Ontario tournaments over the past year in the team kata category.

"We were really, really, really close (to making it last year) but we didn't quite make it," says Kellermann-Thompson. "We've been competing all year so it felt really good to make it this time."

A team kata is a sequence of movements which must be carried out in perfect unison.

"It's basically a fighting form that you perform," says Mills. "They look for proper technique, movements and power and if it's in sync."

'(Part of the judging is of) the level of difficulty," adds Kellermann-Thompson. "You're going to get better points if you pull off a back flip really well than if you just pull off a punch really well."

The boys note that remaining in sync is the most challenging aspect of the routine.

"Everyone has a different body structure, so it's hard to find the perfect median for all of us," says Mills.

Following the kata, they will demonstrate a choreographed application of the fighting movements, called bunkai.

Mills says that the secret to their success is just to "train, train, train" - something the young martial artists do for 10-12 hours each week in preparation for the championship.

"I'm looking forward to everything (about the competition)," says Sommier. "Just the experience, doing it in front of lots of people and doing a really good job (will be exciting)."

Kellermann-Thompson is also competing in the individual event kumite, a sparring-style competition.

"So you're hitting the other person, but you're not trying to knock them out," he explains. "You're just trying to say, get a perfect roundhouse kick to the face (with the intensity of) just a slap at the most."

The boys' coach - or "shihan" - Rob Patry remarks that it's very uncommon to have three students that flow so well together for the team kata.

"A lot of schools can't put a team of three together that mesh together (so well)," he says. "Two people is easy, but three people is very, very difficult and very rare."

Rarer still is the opportunity to compete at such a high level in the team kata category.

"For the rest of the events it's either the top two or the top three (from each province) that go," says Patry. "But for team kata you have to be first the whole way through, so it's very difficult."

He points out that this is thus a huge accomplishment, and that the boys worked extremely hard to get to this point.

"It feels really good to see the students' hard work and training is paying off," he says.

Patry's advice to his students going into the competition: work hard, keep an open mind and learn lots.

"All you can ever ask is that they enjoy themselves, that they keep their eyes open, their ears open and that they learn as much as they possibly can along the way to give themselves a story."

Patry hopes that this is only the beginning of what the boys will accomplish in competition. Indeed, the three teens have already been invited to give a demonstration at the World Kabudo Championships, which will be held in France at the end of May

"It's an important (step) for them because it opens up a lot of doors in the karate world," says Patry.




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