Karate championships headed for Geelong

KARATE teams from across the nation will descend on the Geelong Arena next week as the city hosts the Australia National Championships for the first time.

This year’s event marks 50 years of the competition and runs from August 2 to August 4.

Karate Victoria is hosting the competition on behalf of Karate Australia, the national body in charge of the championships.

Karate Victoria president Muzaffer Dickinson said the theme of the competition was to be better together and all about unifying people.

“I’m excited to actually be in Geelong to showcase what karate is about and to actually try and get it out into the regional communities and to have them participate more in karate,” he said. “It’s very rare we hold the championships in what we regard as a regional location, so this is unique in that sense.”

About 585 athletes across 100 divisions will compete, with the event also forming part of selection for the senior team world championships.

Participants will compete in kata and kumite in different categories across three days.

“The highlight of the event is usually the team kumite, which is on the Sunday; that gathers a lot of entertainment value and is generally the highlight of the tournament,” Mr Dickinson said.

To qualify to compete nationally, participants must first be selected on the state team by competing at tournaments and going through a selection process.

The national championships is the peak event within Australia. Competitors then move on to the world championships towards the end of the year and head to Europe in preparation.

Championships teams are made up of people from all age groups, ranging from six years old to veterans over 55.

“Karate is an unusual situation where you can’t necessarily just call it a sport because unlike soccer or anything else, it’s also a lifelong pursuit,” Mr Dickinson said.

“We have competitors and participants from an early age to a very old age; they never stopped participating in karate.”

The 50th year will be celebrated with a special opening ceremony, a booklet with the history of the federation and presentations to dignitaries.

Spectators are welcome and tickets are available at trybooking.com/events/landing/1242076?

For more information about the championships, head to karatevictoria.com.au