2008 British National Championship

The British National Taekwondo Championship is the key sporting event for any Taekwondo practitioner. This year the championship was held at the Manchester Sportcity Velodrome on the 6th and 7th September.

Team Gurumu, which consists of 11 strong players aged between seven to 18 spent the summer preparing themselves to show the sport what they are exactly capable of at the ultimate championship of the year.

Gurumu are no strangers to success and added to their countless previous victories by finishing, with only 11 fighters, at the end of the two days with four Gold, four Silver and two Bronze medals. On day two of the National Championship, Gurumu with an outstanding team score of 62 point were crowned the National Taekwondo Champions of 2008.

Team Gurumu performed to a consistently high standard and were able to withstand the difficult contests thrown in their direction with many of their fighters enduring through gruelling preliminary rounds before entering the medal stages. Gurumu in total won 20 fights, which was nearly double the number of wins in comparison to its rivals.

Gurumu’s youngest fighter, seven year old Amrou Greenidge, stunned the crowds with his speed and determination, winning in the final by knocking out his opponent with an impressive turning kick to the head, and scooping a stunning Gold medal. His victory was followed by Michelle Saguan who also completed her match with a knockout performance, adding yet another Gold medal to the team’s total. Siblings Thangaes and Neeleeny Nithirajah followed suit by impressing the crowds with four out of seven knockouts out fights. Thangaes who had 29 competitors in his weight division seamlessly defeated his competitor’s dreams by winning all his fights. Neeleeny followed up with an equally victorious performance with both bagging another two Gold medals for Team Gurumu.

Silver medal were won by siblings Viroshan and Vaisaly Gnanapandithan, Hary Sivakumar and Denis Neuman. Finally the Bronze were taken by Rajveer Chana and Gurami Ghambashidze.

All the Gurumu Silver and Bronze medal fighters fought extremely well. Viroshan and Hary both fought four fights each in their respective weight divisions. With less then 5 fights Viroshan show a lot of courage and professionalism in the ring. He was very unfortunate to loose the final 12 – 10 but yet his performance was outstanding. Rajveer fought three fights and he certainly did not have it easy as his semi-final match was a bit controversial when his three head shots did not score, therefore loosing the game with tiny gap of one point.

Finally Brandon needs to be acknowledged too, he picked up a serious Achilles Injury during the first week of training. This meant that he could not train for the remaining of the sessions. The doctors confirmed that he has Achilles Tendinitis and not to do any physical sport especially fighting until it gets better but Brandon was determined that he competes at the nationals.

On Brandon's first fight his anckle started to play up, this really stopped him from fighting and he ended up loosing the fight. Altough his did not medal we are confident that Brandon will come back stronger for the next championship.

In total eight out 11 Gurumu fighters managed to fight their way into the finals and this by far is Gurumu’s best ever national championship results.

Team Gurumu were thrilled about their performance and had much to articulate about the team’s unified approach, positive attitude and high achievements. Chief Coach Mr Sivakumar Renganathan, 4th Dan was ecstatic as he expressed his delight over his team’s performance. He commented, “We too like Team GB at the Olympics have surpassed our expectations”. He also added by saying “The team have worked extremely hard and the team coaches have put in a lot of time and effort by creating them an elite training programme which has paid off. I am happy and proud of my team and my club and our ultimate goal is to get a club representative at the 2012 London Olympics and that is what we will be working towards”.

The team have already started training for the London Open Championship on the 5th October 2008 in Tooting and the Ultimate Open Championship on the 12th October 2008 at the Metro Dome in Mansfield.

"A HUGE CONGRATULATIONS TO THE ENTIRE GURUMU NATIONAL TEAM"