Athletes from City West Taekwondo swept almost all before them at the National Taekwondo Championships. 72112 Picture: CONTRIBUTED
By Liam Twomey
ATHLETES from City West Taekwondo in Hoppers Crossing have returned to Melbourne after a dominating display at the National Taekwondo Championships at the Australian Institute of Sport in Canberra.
The club was represented by almost 30 athletes at the championships and needed an extra suitcase on the way home to accommodate their medal haul.
City West outperformed some entire states on their way to 23 gold, nine silver and five bronze.
“We have great people at City West with an excellent team of coaches and that makes a big difference,” club president Frank De Pasquale said.
“I’m very pleased with the results of the club, everything looks positive for us at the moment.
“I’ve never really judged our results on medals or how we go against other competition.
“It’s always been about the performance itself.
“There is a very positive atmosphere around the club and that’s the way we like it. We are not big on negative behaviour.”
The City West team was led by stand-out performer Carla De Pasquale who dominated her competition rivals.
The 14-year-old won five gold medals and one silver medal from her six events entered.
She is also the daughter of Frank.
“Carla started taekwondo at age five and she has seen the sport at home since day dot but the goals she has are all hers.” De Pasquale said.
“We have a policy of no taekwondo at home. She trains daily to get to the position she is in and if she doesn’t train she will be researching on the internet to see what other competitors are up to.”
Carla will have a number of opportunities to add to her growing medal cabinet as she prepares to take on some of the best competition in the world at next year’s US Open.
For now she will continue to train at City West and the club has no plans to slow down after the outstanding results.
With a stand-out team of technical and fighting coaches around him, De Pasquale can only see improvement in the club.
“We have a core group of fighters who are really starting to become elite,” he said.
“Now it is basically about lifting those guys up.
If they can raise their level to about another 15 per cent, they are good enough to become competitive internationally”.
The club wants to expose its athletes to a higher standard of competition by bringing some international fighters to train with them.
If they continue to improve, City West Taekwondo’s biggest problem might be where to put all their awards.
