Determined Elly wins national title (From Ilkley Gazette)

Determined Elly wins national title

12:48am Thursday 8th July 2010 in Sport By Sportsdesk

Ilkley Karate Club student Elly Field was crowned national kumite champion following an outstanding performance at the SKU National Championships at the English Institute of Sport in Sheffield.

Throughout her bouts the 11-year-old fought off competitors from other karate clubs in the under-40kg brown and black belt category.

In addition to her outstanding victory, Elly also won two bronze medals in the black belt kata events, making it three victories on the day.

Her success follows on from her winning the same titles last year, and this now makes in a hat-trick of first place kumite (free fighting) titles from all the SKU competitions in the last 12 months.

Club instructor Mark Outterside spoke in glowing terms of his student, who works hard and whose passion for her sport merits this fantastic achievement.

Elly has been involved in martial arts since the age of six under Outterside’s guidance at the Ilkley Karate Club.

Inspired by her success, Elly now hopes to compete in the World Traditional Karate Championships in October where she will face formidable competition from cadets from over 30 countries.

Fellow Ilkley karate students also did well on the day. Out of the nine club members competing, the club won three first, one second and seven third-place trophies.

Ilkley’s winners included – Kumite, boys’ green to purple belt 10-12 years under 45kg: 1 Josh Beattie. Boys’ brown belt 11 to 13 years under-55kg: 1 Sam Davison. Girls’ brown and black belt 10-12 years under 40kg: 1 Elly Field.