Best of luck to the Irish Squad who are travelling to Bulgaria on the 14th May for the EITF European Championships. Accompanying the Team as Umpires will be Senior Master Francis Barrett, Master Robert Howard and Mr Floyd Keane.

For a full list of competitors divisions visit http://www.itfireland.ie/ competition.htm

RITA members have been invited to attend the International Instructor Course under Grand Master Hwang Ho Yong in Holland June 1st-3rd, 2012. The International Instructor Course represents the International Instructor training and International Instructor refreshment course as a whole and the purpose of it is to improve the quality of Taekwon-Do education among the practitioners training in ITF Dojangs, by enhancing the International Instructors’ teaching quality and competence.   (participation:3rd degree and higher). There will also be a National Seminar on the third day which is open for 2nd Kups upward.

For more details download the information pack
Click here to download the application (excel)

Sunday the 15th of April was my first experience of the Ladies Training Day. I drove down to Carrick-on Suir from Dublin with Sandra, Liza and Laura from Grandmaster Howards Dojang. The weather was sunny and warm which set the tone for the day. Sandra Regan of the Carrick TKD School had given me directions and we arrived at 10am.

The day started at 11am Ms Valerie Keane our instructor invited us to get to know our taekwon do sisters by introducing ourselves and talking to our new friends, getting to know as may names as we could.

The warm up consisted of stretching, fundamental movements. The atmosphere was light and fun. But with Ms Keane’s guidance we would learn throughout the day. We worked our way through all the patterns from saju jirigi through the current pattern we were learning. Fine tuning our stances, our turns with foot placements throughout, our punches and blocks. The sparring was fun too. Going through sparring routines to learn new moves, sparring with girls from other schools was good too. We also used padded sticks which were terrific fun.

The highlight of a great day for me was the power /breaking. I had only ever seen senior male black belts breaking roof tiles so when Ms Keane invited us to try this was really exciting. I broke a roof tile with a knife hand strike under Ms Keane’s direction and an inch of pine with a side piecering kick.  All the girls & women broke during the afternoon with a kick or a punch appropriate to their grade. Many of us chose to do break’s that we had not tried or been successful with on previous occasions. I think that we had so much fun during the day and were on such a high that we could have broke anything our confidence was so much improved as a result of all that we learned in a female centric atmosphere. It really was a great day and I hope to go again next year and would recommend it to all girls and woman in RITA Schools. The day will re-ignite your enthusiasm for taekwondo and sharpen your desire to learn more and set new goals.

Breda O’ Donoghue 1st Kup
Grandmaster Howard’s  Dojang

For more photos visit the St. Mark's & Naas Taekwon-Do School Facebook page

Senior Master Barrett along with more than 40 participants from across the world including Grand Masters and Senior Masters attended the Seminar in Thailand.

The main purpose of this seminar was to provide the participants with the opportunity to learn how to teach the students as an International Instructor, not as a Coach and what knowledge they have to deal with during the training.

It is a well-known fact that ITF has decided at its 19th Congress to divide the International Course into the International Technical Seminar and International Instructor Course for the purpose of the unified & combined education on the TKD Techniques invented by Founder Gen. Choi Hong Hi as well as of further promoting the skills & abilities of the International Instructors as a Teacher.
Based on it, ITF arranged the first ever arranged Master Seminar in China in Apr. 2010 and it has been a best chance for all participants to reach the unanimous agreements for the contents & methods to be taught by the Conductors in the future Courses.

Entrusted by ITF, Grand Master Hwang Ho Yong, the Chairman of ITF Technical & Education Committee, presided over the seminar for the technical points and Grand Master Leong Wai Meng for the sections of both Moral Culture and Business through the TKD training & activities.

At the end of seminar, there was a particular meeting among the persons including GM Leong Wai Meng, GM Hwang Ho Yong, GM Kim Ung Chol and GM Phap Lu who had been appointed as the Conductors for the International Courses.

The key agreements made at this seminar are below;
- In Pattern Ge-Baek and Eui-Am, when you perform the Low Twisting Kick you must not make a pause after kicking but instead, pull the kicking leg back immediately.
- The movements 5 and 17 in Pattern Ju-Che must be executed in a slow motion to the end of the movements.
The Slow Motions mentioned in all Patterns must be carried out in accordance with this principle.

The NGBs are kindly required to pay the due attention to the above points because the competitors are obliged to perform those techniques as indicated in above from the upcoming Junior & Veteran Championships scheduled in Tallinn, Estonia in Aug. this year.

(from ITF HQ)

Click here to see full year

The next RITA National Colour Belt Development Squad training session will take place in Carrick on Saturday 21st April from 11am to 3pm. This session will be a bit longer than previous ones, as footage from the last two competitions will be shown. In the meantime, colour belts are required to compete in the upcoming ITF Ireland Cup in Cork on Saturday, 31st March.

For more information please contact Mr Paul Tobin, Coach on 087-2447886 or paultbn@gmail.com, or Mr Adam Fox, Assistant Coach on 087-6900948 or adamrpfox@gmail.com.

RITA Instructors and Students can now view the TKD Supplies stock online. Click here to see our latest prices and stock.