Jack back on Podium in Spain
Jack on the Podium in Spain
Jack Woolley was back in flying form at last weekend’s Spanish Open in Benicassim, Spain. The event which was designated a World Taekwondo Federation G1 ‘Grade 1’ ranking event with valuable points on offer for athletes. After the disappointment of a joint 9th Finish in Germany the week before, Jack was back in full form with his legs fired up throughout the event. Jack was seeded 2nd in the division which contained athletes from around the world, and usually attracts many Spanish speaking nations. In his first round match Jack drew a local Spaniard Jose Ignacio Munoz Trejo in a good warm up for the 17 year old who finished the match early by the 12 points gap rule 14-0. The second match was a tougher test with Moroccan National Team Amine Elharmazi in the way of a podium finish. Jack finished the match 16-2 in Irelands favour once again by ‘points gap’. This led to a semi-final against the African Games Champion Moaz Nabil of Egypt who Jack faced twice before, most recently in the final of the Moroccan Open, where the match went all the way to the wire where Jack pipped the gold medal from the clutches of Nabil in the last second. Jack unleashed himself early in the match utilising lessons learned previously and his relentless kicking saw him through to the Spanish Open final for the second year running winning 18-7. The final was a mouth-watering affair where he was to face off against Cesar Rodriguez of Mexico, the current World #2 and one of the celebrities in the World of Taekwondo. Rodriguez has already secured an auto-qualify berth of Mexico in the upcoming Rio Olympics, is a former World Champion and multiple WTF Grand Prix medallist. Jack took an early lead with a score of 4-1 but was unfortunate to have 3 points waved off for a suggested infringement as one of his signature ‘scorpion kicks’ was deemed to be thrown illegally, however Jack stayed in touch throughout a excellently fought match by both athletes, ending with a 8-4 score-line to the Mexican. Jack won silver, and more importantly gained an additional 6 World & Olympic ranking points to assist his seeding for next months European Championships. This was jacks 3rd podium at his third Spanish open, 4th podium if you count his silver medal for Poomsae [technical taekwondo] in 2012. Jack began his ranking event medal haul 4 years ago in Alicante when he won a bronze medal aged 13 in the cadet division, which has been a springboard to a 4 year Olympic effort where he fell just short finishing 3rd place in the European Olympic Qualifiers, needing to be placed 2nd to qualify. Jack stays on in Madrid for a few days at a training camp with his Finnish Taekwondo training partner Suvi Mikkonen who fought in London 2012 and has qualified for Rio. The camp will be attended by Serbian Olympic Gold medallist Milica Mandic and Tijana Bogdanovic both of whom also have qualified for Rio before returning to Ireland to join his South Dublin Team mates who head out to the German Open G1 in Hamburg this coming weekend. SDTKD would like to thank Hankuk Taekwondo from Madrid for their kind assistance to our team in recent months and for coaching Jack at the event.