dyton mupawaenda
Sports Reporter
TOP martial artist Wilfred Mashaya says the Zimbabwe Kobudo team is feeling positive ahead of their participation at the World Martial Arts Championships in England.
The championships include various styles, categories and forms of martial arts that are point fighting, full contact, light contact, forms, Muay Thai, boxing and weaponry among others.
Zimbabwe is being represented by the Kobudo team under the Zimbabwe Karate Union (ZKU), made up of Mashaya and Vincent Fambira.
The championships got underway yesterday at the University of Hull.
Mashaya and Fambira are up for competition today and tomorrow when they compete in weaponry categories.
“All along I have been going alone for these physical competitions and I am happy that now I managed to take one person for an international event. So now we are two although in August we managed to do another physical competition, which was regional in South Africa.
“So it means a lot for the development of kobudo martial arts in Zimbabwe. It shows growth, it also shows that we have got talent in Zimbabwe that can compete at the world stage.
“So this one being our first international competition to have two people, to me it shows growth. We hope that we are going to do our best and it’s a platform for us to test our skills, especially for Fambira on the world stage.
“We have been training hard, preparing for these championships,” said Mashaya.
This is Fambira’s first international competition and will be hoping to build on his last performance when he bagged two gold medals and one silver at the regional tournament staged in South Africa, in August.
Mashaya said they would have wanted to send a bigger team to participate at the championships but due to financial challenges they ended up fielding just two athletes.
“It’s not something we wanted as we wanted about 10 athletes but due to financial constraints we couldn’t manage.
“But we hope that if we manage to do well, like we did in South Africa we will be able also to attract the corporate world and sponsors to chip in and support us for the good of the sport.
“The Zimbabwe kobudo team has been doing well in weapon/weaponry competitions thereby raising the country’s flag high in sports in previous years.
“During the Covid pandemic period we participated in more than 10 International virtual weapon competitions and bagged more than 200 medals in total, from 2020 to 2022.
“The competitions had the balance of both male and females. Kids were also part of that team, which was made up of 15 athletes, which was selected for the 2020 to 2022 competitions.
“This being our first physical international tournament after the Covid pandemic, we hope to do our best for the nation as well,” said Mashaya.
Mashaya and Fambira arrived in England on Thursday.
Online Reporter