December 12, 2016
The 5th I.K.O. Matsushima Open Kyokushin karate world championship was held in Japanese city Maebashi on November 26-27. 187 sportsmen from 20+ countries took part in the competition. The competition was honored by I.K.O. Matsushima President – Kancho Yoshikazu Matsushima, Vice President John Taylor, and President of European I.K.O. Matsushima Kyokushinkaikan karate organization Klaus Rex.
Our organization delegated to the competition: Head and Branch Chief of the organization Shihan Dmytro Volynets (5th dan) – referee, Sensei Shumik Vadim (3rd damn) – side judge and Olga Bidzura (1st dan) – fighter.
Organization of the competition was satisfactory. It was held at the sports hall of YAMATO Shimin Taiikukan Maebashi. Although the competition among women was to be in different weight categories, there was no weighting procedure before the championship. Draw procedure had no benefit for strong fighters, and they were to meet in the first rounds. Olga Bidzura fought equally with Masedisa Moyaki (SA), but our fighter failed to pass to the next round.
Her opponent from South Africa also quit the competition in the next round, because on the judges’ opinion there was rules violation and unfair fighting.
Between fights one could see demonstrative fights of Japanese karate fighters, children demonstrated tameshivary and adults broke ice-blocks. All the performance was very spectacular, and skilled musicians accompanied it with drumming rhythms on Japanese drums “taiko”.
Sayonara party was conducted in Racine Shinmaebashi hotel. It should be noted that bus transportation to the gym and to the hotel was free for the participants.
After the championship there was traditional training under the Kancho’s guidance. After that there was a dan-test.
In general, delegation of our Federation was pleased with the competition. There was some free time to observe sights of Maebashi. The city has many clean rivers, green plantations and interesting architecture that left strong impressions. Japanese food turned to be quite exotic. Raw fish, seafood with strong spices, and other traditional dishes were of great quality, so they impressed our team favorably and lured to taste such food without fear during the entire staying in Japan. Mentality and affability of the local population also must be mentioned. People met our delegation with respectful bows and smiles. In spite of the language barrier, they used all the means (including gests) to help in finding way to the hotel and even recommended a dish.
