Fegan's fearless determined to go for more than silver in Silverbridge

DETERMINED to go for more than just a silver medal at the Taekwondo Ulster Championships due to be held in Silverbridge this Saturday are  the  fearless fighting squad of Cathal Fegan’s School of Taekwondo.

 A follow up to last years phenomenal tournament  this year’s Ulster Championships  will see the largest rate of attendance  in years to the provincial final attracting as many as 200 competitors.

 As Cathal himself explains this will comprise some of the highest standard  of  red and black fighters who hail from both the province of Ulster and beyond.       

Ulster Championships

“This will be the biggest Ulster's in the last seven years” said Cathal. 200 fighters in total will be attracted to the event.

“We have people coming from Belfast, Hollywood, Bangor, Banbridge, Craigavon, Omagh, Cookstown, Newry, Silverbridge, Dundalk, Wicklow, Cork, Tipperary and Athlone.

“There should be roughly between 80 and 100 red and black belts and then roughly 80 to 100 colour belts also.

“There are going to be a couple of current world and European champions across the country, not just from my club who are coming up to compete in the morning event. Then in the afternoon from 12.30 onwards it is all the other belts from four years of age up to the oldest competitor who I think is 57 years of age. There will be patterns and sparring.

“Ideally in Taekwondo their are four sets of disciplines which you do at the highest level, pattern, sparring, breaking and special technique. In the future if we continue to grow we will hopefully  add this into it and then eventually we are hoping that it goes on the Calendar of the Taekwondo federation of Europe

“Team Ireland has now announced that they are going to use the Ulster Championships, as one of the trials for the Team Ireland Team in April. There are going to be two events, The Ulster Championships and an event at the end of January. Pretty much anyone who wins the Ulster's will be qualified for this Team event that is going to be happening in next April which is the first of its kind in Taekwondo. It makes the event even bigger then it was than in previous years.”

Going beyond Silverbridge

With such a high concentration of the sports finest set to congregate in Silverbridge to compete at Taekwondo’s highest level, Instructor Fegan shared in the fact that it is his ultimate ambition to move the Ulster Championships or an event of similar renown to a larger venue so as to facilitate all competitors simultaneously.

As Cathal explains this would ideally be the Newry City Leisure Centre.

“We have outgrown the Silverbridge Football Club. We are using every inch that we can use in the hall. This is why the types change in the morning. We have the black belts then we have the colour belts. Ideally we would like to have everyone at the same time so we could showcase the black belts. Black belts are not getting the chance to showcase the skills to the younger belts because the younger belts don't arrive until after. Ideally we would like be in a leisure centre and we would have the black belts up in the morning and they would be able to see the likes of Amy, Ethan and Aoife.