Last Saturday (April 27), an international WTF Taekwondo tournament—the 12th Oberlausitz Cup—was held in Radibor, Germany. Eighteen clubs from border towns in Germany, the Czech Republic and Poland took part in the tournament, along with competitors from Denmark. The athletes from UKS Ilyo Bolesławiec won 10 medals: 4 gold, 2 silver and 4 bronze. The gold medals were brought back to Bolesławiec by: Adam Filipek junior, –68 kg; Kamil Serafin junior, –59 kg; Marcin Skiba youth, –47 kg; and Wiktoria Knapczyk cadet, –30 kg. The silver medals were won by: Mateusz Boczarski youth, –37 kg; and Jakub Gwiżdż cadet, –29 kg. The bronze medals went to: Bartek Bąk –80 kg; Klaudia Faltyn youth, –41 kg; Michał Pytliński cadet, –41 kg; and Mateusz Pytliński youth, –41 kg. In the club standings, Ilyo took 4th place, just behind two Berlin clubs and a club from Humpolec, Czech Republic.
Next weekend, the UKS Ilyo athletes will face another test of their skills. Qualifiers for the Polish Junior Taekwondo Championships will be held in Krasnystav. The championships will take place in Wrocław in mid-May.
Two medals at the Polish Youth Olympiad
The 16th final of the Polish Youth Olympiad was held over the weekend (April 23–25) in Ciechanów, Masovian Voivodeship. Two hundred female and male competitors competed in fighting and patterns. The event also featured junior competitors from UKS Ilyo Bolesławiec. Following the regional qualifiers, three of our taekwondo athletes reached the finals.
The athletes from Bolesławiec won 2 medals. The bronze medal went to Remigiusz Różnicki, who, in the –49 kg category, lost in the final seconds of the semifinal to gold medalist Mikołaj Szaferski (AZS OŚ Poznań).
A similar situation, but in the final, affected the current Polish Junior Women’s Vice-Champion Paulina Stojanowska in the –41 kg category, who lost to Martyna Bochenkiewicz of UKS Andros Puławy only in overtime for the so-called “golden point.” Paulina won all her bouts before the final ahead of time, not even giving her opponents a chance to reach the second round. The two athletes from Bolesławiec narrowly missed the higher podium places. In both Remik’s and Paulina’s cases, the final seconds of the bouts determined the final rankings.
Compared with last year’s results, two of our athletes performed significantly better. In 2009, during the OOM finals, Paulina Stojanowska won a bronze medal, while Remigiusz Różnicki finished just outside the podium, in 4th place. However, the event did not go well for Patrycja Radwan, who was making her debut at a nationwide event and lost her first bout in the girls’ –47 kg category to Aleksandra Stawska, a representative of Bydgoszcz. UKS Ilyo also performed somewhat worse in the club standings. “In 2009, at the OOM, Ilyo won 3 medals: 1 gold, 1 silver and 1 bronze, as well as scoring 4th- and 8th-place finishes,” summarizes Mariusz Sulma, coach and president of UKS Ilyo. “Thanks to preparations, training camps and appearances at tournaments funded by the city budget, three Ilyo athletes competed in the OOM finals and earned 15 points for Bolesławiec,” the coach adds.
The Polish Youth Olympiad is one of the most prestigious recurring events in the youth sports system. The best junior competitors from across Poland compete in more than a dozen sports. Olympic Taekwondo is one of the OOM disciplines. A different voivodeship hosts the competition each year. In 2008, Bolesławiec hosted the 14th Polish Youth Olympiad in WTF Taekwondo.
(information from UKS Ilyo/ii)