There were smiles all round at a recent grading at Carnalea Karate Club when a number of junior students tried out for their next belts. Before that they had to endure a tough warm-up and basics session with coach Kevin Lewis. This was followed by some specialised training in preparation for being tested against the set criteria.

New to karate, the following students were awarded their red belts: Tony French, Aimee McAllister, Brooke Morrison and Ryan Bennett.

Yellow with a white stripe were awarded to: Lauren Shields, Eva Morrison, Megan Ogle, Chris Sharpe, Riley Westwood, Dean Miller with Sam Stevenson getting a first class pass.

David Edge was awarded his yellow belt.

The following students were successful going for orange stripe: Nathan Lockhart, Alex Martin, Ryan Jackson and Niamh Pang.

Sophie Stewart was awarded her green stripe and Sarah Shields, GT Wright, Dale McCall and Conor Porter were chuffed to make the difficult step to green belt.

Chief Instructor, David Brashaw explained “Green belt is the first big challenge in the karate belt system for children. At green belt they are expected to show good spirit, quality karate skills and technical control. I am delighted with the performance and progression these children have made over the last few months.”