Kenya placed ninth in African Senior Taekwondo Championships

Kenya finished ninth out of 40 countries at the 2022 African Senior Taekwondo Championships held at Kigali Arena in Rwanda scooping one gold and three bronze medals.

The team departed from Kigali on Monday at 5.30pm for Nairobi aboard Simba coach Bus and are expected to arrive Tuesday night.

Olympian Milka Akinyi Alang’o won Kenya’s only gold medal - in Poomsae (pattern competition) - on July 13, the first day of the five-day competition in the under 40 years’ category.

In the Kyorugi (fighting) category, Olympian Faith Ogallo (heavyweight) along with Everlyn Aluoch Oloo (middleweight) and Sharon Nafula (flyweight) won a bronze medal each in the annual championship.

Ogallo admitted it was a tough outing. She registered 2:0, 3:2 and 3:3 in the three rounds.

She went toe-to-toe against Fatima Aboufaras in the semi-final where they drew 7:7 in round one and 2:2 in round two, but the Moroccan was awarded the match due to the new rules because she was more technical than Ogallo.

“I thank God I managed to put in a good performance. Against Egypt, it was very tough for me but I won. As for Morocco, we were level both in the first and second round but the system awarded her victory automatically because she had hit several times more than I did,” noted Ogallo.

“Attending more tournaments will help me because Morocco were in camp in Great Britain. My opponent was just from the Roma Grand Prix in Italy. That was an opportunity for me and has given me exposure.

I didn't have enough strength. I need to engage more on strength and conditioning and also add more weight because my opponents were very heavy. They all weighed 80 plus kilogrammes and I was between 73 and 75.”

On her part, Nafula was so happy bagging bronze at the African level.

“It's obviously not the colour I wanted, but I am thankful that it is a stepping stone. It's been a lot of years of blood sweat and tears, almost literally.”

Nafula, who won gold during the India Cup international championship in Goa a few weeks ago, exuded confidence that with the exposure, she can correct her mistakes as well as improve her confidence to get a medal at that high stage.

“This is my year and I'm ready to receive all the blessings that are in store for me in my sports career,” she said, while thinking the federation, coaches, club, team-mates, sponsors, family and God for her latest success.

Aluoch said her medal came as a surprise to her.

“Despite praying and hoping for the best, I can't claim that it was a guaranteed thing. It was just by the grace of God,” she said.

Aluoch noted that she will now re-evaluate herself, learn and focus more on her weak points to enable her to get better.

In the last edition held in 2021 in Dakar, Senegal, Kenya finished seventh with three bronze medals won by Ogallo, Aluoch and Mary Muriu.