SKA to host 2020 National Meet
Sabah has been given the honour to host the 40th Makaf National Senior Karate Open Championship 2020, as reported by New Sabah Times on 6th February 2020.
Sabah to host National Senior Karate C’ship
6th February, 2020
By FRANCIS XAVIERKOTA KINABALU: Sabah has been given the honour to host the 40th Makaf National Senior Karate Open Championship 2020.
Sabah Karate Association (SKA) Secretary-General, Julian Chin, said they have been given the nod to stage the tournament by the Malaysia Karate Federation (Makaf) recently.
He said the tournament, which is under Makaf’s annual calendar, will be happening at the Kota Kinabalu Sports Complex multipurpose hall in Likas, from June 10-14.
“We are glad to have been given the task to organise the national senior level championship. In fact, it is an honour for Sabah to play host to the championship,” said Julian when contacted yesterday.
He added that they are expecting more than 300 athletes, coaches and officials from throughout the country to take part.
“Since this is a Malaysia Games (Sukma) year … we are expecting all of the national body affiliate members, as well as clubs to send a team because this competition will be the last national-level tournament prior to Sukma,” he added.
According to Julian, they will get the ball rolling in preparing themselves to host the championship starting from now.
“We want to be a good host and we believe that we can do it because we have the experience to do so.
“In the past, we have been hosting national level championships as well as international level tournaments and we managed to organise them successfully and I believe we can do it again this time around,” said Julian.
On another note, he said they will be using the championship to put their Sukma athletes to the test.
“We will parade our Sukma team for sure. This is likely to be the last venue for us to put them to the test because Sukma will be happening about a month later.
“So after the championship (senior) we will be using the remaining days to rectify their (athletes) weaknesses to make sure that they will be ready for the Games,” said Julian.
Back to the senior championship, he said they will be sending a full team with the hope that they will do better than they did last year where they finished second-best overall with a medal collection of three gold, three silver and seven bronze medals.
Then, they won the gold medals through Pressy Misty Philip (Female Kumite -68kg category), Audrey Jaypus (Female Kumite +68kg) and Bukit Jalil-based Richal Mattan (Male Kumite -55kg). Penang are the defending overall champions.
Last time out, they lifted the overall title with five gold and three silver medals.
Original link: http://www.newsabahtimes.com.my/nstweb/fullstory/36428
