Soevereign Judocup Belgium 2013 – Results

On Friday 13 April at 6.00am three Cobra competitors (Ethan, Jack and Arunas) began their eight hour journey along with the Nottinghamshire Squad to attend an International judo competition that was held in Lommel, Belgium.

On arrival at our usual accommodation, which is an excellent youth hostel in Overpelt, we unpacked our bags and settled into our rooms, once unpacked all of the children headed outside onto the huge park whilst the adults made use of the self service bar area.

In the evening we held a quick team talk and then we made our way into town to visit the same restaurant as last year, a nice little place that served a variety of food and had something that everyone would like and it was not too expensive.

Once refuelled we headed back to the hostel bar where Chris again settled in as head barman. Saturday’s competitors headed to bed ready for an early start the next day.

7.00am Saturday and it was time for everyone to get up and head down to breakfast for 7.30am, we were served with a continental breakfast and hot and cold refreshments.

After breakfast we made our way over to the competition venue and claimed our seats for the day’s contests.

After a warm up session our first players were called to the mat, all of the competitors today were grouped into pools of four and this would mean they would all have at least three contests each.

Jack was up first and he quickly dispatched his first opponent with an Ippon throw, the second contest was a close match with Jack scoring a winning Waza-ari seconds before the end. Jack then took the third and final contest scoring two Waza-ari’s to claim the win and also the Gold medal.

Ethan was next and quickly claimed his first victory with an Ippon throw, he then lost the second contest being thrown for Ippon, and in the third and final contest he took the win throwing his opponent for yuko and the holding for Ippon securing second place and a Silver medal.

We then waited for the remaining Notts players to finish (who secured the remaining three Notts medals) and headed to Keiheuvel in Balen, which is a large nature park with a huge adventure play area. Here whilst the children entertained themselves we had some lunch before heading back to our hostel.

Sunday we were again up early for breakfast and the whole team and supporters made their way over to the venue for the second day of competition.

This was a much more difficult day and all of the Nottinghamshire players, which included Arunas, fought really well but did not claim any medals. Once all the contests had completed we headed to a local McDonald’s restaurant before returning to the hostel for a deserved rest and refresh. In the evening we headed again back to the local restaurant for our final meal of the weekend with them.

The next day we were up and ready at 6.00am for the return trip home.

This was a fantastic event, we had great weather, company and players we are very proud of. We would like to thank the parents and children supporters from our club (Paul, Chris, Gary, Adam, Murray Chloe and Tia) who made this journey with us and supported and encouraged the players throughout and also provided some laughs along the way.