Karate England Squad Training

The Karate England squad training was held at Loughborough University on Sunday 25 October and attracted over 80 participants. The training session was taken by Abdu Shaher and Ian Cuthbert but featured a guest appearance by former French WKF World Champion Christophe Pinna.

Christophe was already in the country running a seminar in London and gladly accepted the invitation. Firstly Christophe went through a hard plyometric warm-up session and then went on to show some of the concepts that have made his techniques so explosive. The principles were explained thoroughly and the KE squad took those on board working hard throughout the extended first session. Christophe then rushed off to the airport and after lunch Abdu continued to put the squad through some creative drills that were targeted to enhance the competitor’s mental capacity in the competition environment.

The squad were then split up into a number of teams within each age group fighting under Abdu’s watchful eye and the referees that had come along to support the squad. Abdu was noting down the depth of talent that was on show within the respective age groups and reminded all competitors that he would be watching them all at the forthcoming Karate England National Championship on 14 November in Sheffield.

Abdu proceeded to motivate the squad in taking responsibility for preparing for the WUKF Senior European Championships, Portugal in April 2010 and the WUKF Children’s, Cadet, Junior World Championships, Brazil in July 2010. Date of the next Karate England Squad training is 14 February 2010 at Loughborough Lesiure Centre.