SCORPION Judo Club travelled to Eastley earlier this month for the Hampshire Judo Championships.

The club took 20 kids and two adults with many fighting at their first competition and some fighting for first time in a few years thanks to Covid.

In Judo competitors fight in their weight category against those of the same sex. This competition was split into under 12s and under 16 for the kids and then adults.

Up first were the under 12s and representing the club were five girls and four boys. All fought hard and produced the best judo they could. Everyone had multiple fights during a hard morning.

When all the fights were done the club came away with two gold and three bronze medals and lots of lessons learnt.

Next up were the u16s and the club had eight girls and four boys fighting in this category. Most of these fighters had fought before and they quickly got back into it.

There were some really good fighters in this age with lots of experience and the standard in most cases was high with some very tough fighting.

At the end of the fights the club came away with two golds, two silvers and five bronze medals. Everyone again doing their very best with some fighting really well but still missing out on a medal.

Two Scorpions took the mat for the adults which was a open event including black belts. The fighters were relative novices but produced some shocks beating higher grade opponents.

The club said it was great to see some hard attacking judo and it came away with another gold medal.

A spokesperson said: “All in all it was a great day of fighting and lots of lessons learned and things to work on identified. Fifteen medals and those 15 individuals now go into the Hampshire County squad to fight for our county in the inter counties championships.”

Medals and squad patches were presented to the kids by our the club’s own Harriet McRea who is part of the Great British Junior team.

They added: “Coaches Jeff, Hayley and Tim were very pleased with the days efforts and look forward to more fights now the competition circuit is back. If you would like to try Judo book an session via our Facebook page.”