WTF Gala Awards – Baku – 2016
Irish Taekwondo was represented at the 2016 WTF Gala Awards in Baku, Azerbajain last weekend where there wolds top & athletes & coaches received invites to celebrate the year of taekwondo. Awards were given to the best athletes from around the world, best coach & best officials. The event was opened by the WTF President Dr. Chongwon Choue who outlined the massive enhancement to Olympic Taekwondo in the Worlds this year, which was recoginsed by the WTF’s winning of the ‘Federation of the Year’ at theWorld Peace & Sports Awards in Monaco. Club members Jack Woolley & Coach Robert Taaffe were in Baku for the 2016 Grand Prix Final where jack competed in the -58kg division. This was jacks first taste of Grand Prix events, and like many first timers, he was thrown in the deep end on his first outing. Jack met the European Champion Mourad Laachraoui in his opening match unfortunately which was to be his only one. 14-2 was the final score to the Belgian, and whilst it was a bitter pill to swallow, it should prove to be an important stepping stone on Jacks pathway to the Tokyo Olympics. Jack who fights -54kg [a non Olympic weight] had to go up to 58kg for the event which had the top 16 in the World in attendance. A result of joint 9th will however yield some very important Olympic Ranking Points for the 18 year old. His Coach Taaffe noted, ‘We know coming away that just being selected for the event was a massive achievement, i think we both know Jack has more in him than today’s result, we fought Mourad in USA this year and it was 8-4 in the final to the Belgian. We have some work to do, there are 4 more Grand Prix’s next year, and we hope with another year behind us Jack can make some in-roads to these events. For now it will be back to Jacks actual fighting weight, and focus on improving on his #3 in the Worlds rankings, to assist a good placing for next years World Championships in Korea. Some onlookers thought we were crazy this year with the amount of activity Jack had, but his strike rate & podium rate is incredible. With so many events, not all can go our way.’
The event wrapped up a phenomenal year for Woolley which was summarised on South Dublin Taekwondo’s Facebook page:
‘Not a bad year…. 9xG1 Podiums (Reached podium in all G1’s attended), 2xG2 Podiums, G4 – Participation, G8 – Participation, Olympic Qualifiers – 3rd, 3 Gold, 7 Silver, 3 Bronze, 40 Matches, 100 Rounds…. one of hardest working athletes in combat sports in the world. Irish Flag proudly took its place on the right arm of uniform in… Istanbul, Reno, Montreal, Fujairah, Antalya, Bonn, Hamburg, Castellon, Innsbruck, Thessaloniki, Luxembourg, Riga, Portland, Paris, Baku…. and DUBLIN!