Australian Master Games 2009

Geelong - Sat 21st & Sun 22nd Feb

Well done to the Schembris Team for a fantastic achievement !

 

Pan Pacific Master Games 2008

Competition drives Master’s athletes

At the recent Pan Pacific Masters Games held on the Gold Coast, over 10,000 competitors from all over the world congregated to participate.  Once again taekwondo was one of the 34 sports included in the nine days of events.

   

One of the Victorian teams making the journey to compete was Schembri’s Taekwondo club, this year we brought our biggest contingency of competitors thus far, 24 in all.  Schembri’s have been making the journey north to participate in the Pan Pacific Masters for the past ten years.  For some of our team, it was the first time they had participated at the Pan Pacific or any competition, for others like Rob Schembri, Head Instructor it was the fifth time he had competed.

The Pan Pacific Masters has a more relaxed atmosphere than other tournaments.  It provides the perfect stepping stone for the older taekwondo players, new to the sport thinking about competing.  There is the opportunity to socialise with fellow taekwondo competitors as well as competitors from other sports. 

                            

As a club, we entered for the competition and to have fun.  We haven’t added our medal tally but know we had a very successful tournament.  This culminated in one of our Instructors, Sam Papaleo winning the ‘player of the tournament’ trophy. 

A great recognition of the success he had on the day and his attitude towards competing and his fellow competitors.

 

And if further inspiration was needed, we had to look no further than the star of the 60+ age group Stella Edmondson, a great advocate for the sport.

Participating at the Pan Pacific Masters has inspired our team to register for the Australian Masters being held in Geelong in February.  Unlike Queensland, down south we expect perfect weather and no rain.

 

Local Pan Pacs Champion

Congratulations so Kinglake Ranges Resident Debbie Gray (in the middle) for her success at this year's Pan Pacific Master Games. Debbie has been a Taekwondo player for 16 years and has been training with Schembris Taekwondo in Bundoora for seven years. Debbie is a 4th Dan black belt and is respected and loved by students and peers. She has put in a lot of hard work training for three months leading up to the games. Debbie attended her first Masters in 2004 and recently got got back from the 2008 Pan Pacific Games with our team of 22 competitors with four medals to her credit: Gold (sparring), Silver (Team Creative Poomsae), Silver (Board Breaking) and Bronze (Team Traditional Poomse). Debbie is an inspiration to all our members, in particular the mature players, showing you can be any age for this sport. In the above photo we also have two other Schembris team members: Anita and Carolee.