ST. PETERS—Students from the King Yen Taekwondo School are busy preparing for try-outs. A team of athletes will be selected to represent St. Maarten at the 26th Puerto Rico International Taekwondo Open Championships.
More than 300 athletes representing Columbia, Dominican Republic, USA, St. Croix, the United States and host Puerto Rico are expected to compete.
The competition will feature World Taekwondo Federation rules with the electronic scoring.
In addition to their regular training schedule the athletes are currently participating in extra practice at the Hillside Christian School Gymnasium.
A total of 11 athletes age 6 to 45 will travel to Puerto Rico March 6 with Grandmaster Theo Liu leading the delegation which will include three team officials and parents.
“Our excellent international tournament accomplishments in the past years have earned us another invitation to represent St. Maarten,” said Grandmaster Liu.
The competition founded and organized by Master Bill Zafiropoulos will be March 8. The team is set to return home March 9. The team will compete in both form demonstrations called Taeguks and sparring.
“We want to give our new athletes the great opportunity to acquire international experience,” said Liu. “They will come back as different athletes with high spirit and discipline.”
The trip will be expensive due to limited direct flights to Puerto Rico. The team will be smaller than usual and will feature more first-time competitors. Master Liu is looking to groom more athletes for upcoming events including a trip to the United States and another to Asia.
Despite featuring new athletes, the team will travel in their tradition St. Maarten uniform with SXM printed on the back. The St. Maarten flag will fly in the competition hall and Grandmaster Liu is sure the St. Maarten song will be played often as the athletes reactive medals they have earned.
