The annual Korean Ambassador's Cup was held again in Helsinki, at Tikkurila Sports Hall on Saturday 27.9. The competition is always one of the biggest of the year and this time it attracted competitors from Estonia and Denmark.
Business series
TU went into the competitions in full force, with every member of the competition team in the bosom participating either as a competitor, judge or both.
The cadet boys were Luca and Josef, with Luca being ranked 1st in the series straight into the semi-finals, and Josef starting from the quarter-finals. Josef's opponent was Elias Au-Nguyen of Denmark, who after a close battle was just a tad better, with Josef finishing 5th. Luca's opponent, Viljami Elonen of Pori Taekwondo, was also a little better this time and Luca shared 3rd place and a bronze medal.
Alex competed in the men's U30 category, where his first opponent in the semi-finals was Frans Salmi (Wondo Espoo). Alex performed brilliantly and the points difference was very narrow, but Frans was still victorious. Alex also won bronze with a shared 3rd place.
The women's U30 series was again the biggest of the Games with 16 participants. TU also had the most competitors in this category, with three: Aino, Sofia and Anna, who made her debut on the ranking side. In the first round, Sofia was immediately up against the top ranked player in the series, Mia Knutsson from Wondo Espoo. Sofia's performance was excellent and the fight was tight, with the score almost tied after the first round. However, the second semi-final brought a little more difference in favour of Mia who progressed to the final. So Sofia shared 9th place.
Anna and Aino advanced directly to the second round, where Anna made a great ranking debut, but the first match win was still on hold, resulting in a split 5th place for Anna. After 2 match wins, Aino advanced to the final where a fierce battle for the series win was waged, with the aforementioned Mia Knutsson narrowly beating her. Aino won silver in the biggest series of the competition!
In the women's O50 category, TU's Kirsimarja competed. In the final she was up against Olga Rantamäki of Wondo Helsinki, and Kirsimarja took the gold medal with a sure hand.
On the doubles side in the U17 age group Luca competed with Aliya Halhul (Wondo Helsinki). The pair who won the Beach SM gold earlier this summer tied with Topias Elosen and Amina Halhul of Pori Taekwondo and Wondo Helsinki, with presentation points going to the latter pair. Luca and Aliya took third place and bronze, with silver just a touch away, with the gold medal going to Denmark.
In the U30 pairs Sofia and Alex competed with their partners Lassi Kaasinen (Herttoniemen Taekwondo Hwang) and Kerttu Salminen (Wondo Espoo). Again, the difference between silver and bronze was subtle, with Sofia and Lassi taking silver by one hundredth of a point from Alex and Kerttu, who took home the bronze medal. In the O50 pairs, Kirsimarja and Antti Vehman (HNMKY) started the whole race with the first performance of the morning. The performances were solid and the result was gold, so double gold for Kirsimarja!
TU was represented by Aino and Sofia in the women's U30 series with Mia Knutsson. This new line-up has quickly welded together and with great performances they won the series and gold.
In the amateur series, Andrra made her debut in the Kids Blue series, where she competed for the first time. Andrra had a strong performance, finishing in 11th place. We will definitely be hearing more about this youngster! Viivi competed in two series, Blue Belts Female and Diesel Female. First up was the Diesel series, where Viivi took a great silver medal, later in the Blue Belts series Viivi came 7th.
Match
The good performances of the bouts left a bitter aftertaste, as the organisers made mistakes that forced some fighters to wait an unreasonably long time.
In the amateur and beginner categories Max, Minttu and Isabella competed. Isabella took the gold medal and Max and Mintu the silver medals. Mintu's debut match was played above her age group, as there was no E-girl to play against. So there was a gold medal in her own age group.
The ranking series were Narvin (gold), Milay (gold), Eero (bronze), Zahra (bronze), Anton, Alexandra and Max.
Narvin and Milay are heading to the Latvian G1 tournament this coming weekend, so the wins came with a bit of saving the hardest shots. The most interesting debutant was Zahra, who has spurs from Iran, but unfortunately the long break from training still showed in the match.
Eero, Anton, Alexandra and Max showed some good performances, but the whole still didn't hold together. However, they gained a lot of experience and in the next races all four of them will certainly be in higher positions.