---

Four out of seven of the Bermuda Sanshou team members took the platform on the opening day of competition on October 25 at the World Wushu Championships in Canada.

Despite the Bermuda team putting up formidable challenges to their opponents they all went down 2 rounds to 0.

Talia Iris lost to Gulsah Kiyak from Turkey, while Garon Wilkinson went down to Saidullayev Adilzhan from Kazakhstan. Iris landed some great head punches, however, she was unable to neutralize in the clinch and suffered a number of takedowns which helped her opponent to outscore her.

Wilkinson started off the match well flooring his opponent within the first 10 seconds with a counter punch and then taking him down later in the round. Wilkinson's much taller opponent used his reach advantage to score a number of straight left punches that would help him secure the match.

Shannon Ford was defeated by Adgeferson Diniz Da Silva from Brazil, and Jermal Woolridge was defeated by Patrick Schmid from Switzerland.

Ford was up against the same opponent that san shou fighter Leroy Maxwell fought in last year's Pan American Championships in Brazil.

"We all knew that Da Silva was a takedown artist and we came up with a strategy for Shannon to avoid the takedowns."

Ford caught him with some good punches to the head and a few good kicks to the body however it was not quite enough to beat the skilled Brazilian. Woolridge's match against Switzerland was very close and could have gone either way in the first round.

In the second round, the Swiss fighter landed more strikes and outscored Woolridge for the win.

On the second day of competition Sentwali Woolridge took on Ismail Aliev from Russia in an exciting two round match with the Russian coming out as the winner at the World Wushu Championships in Canada.

Woolridge attacked his opponent with some vicious leg kicks and took him down at the final buzzer at the end of the first round with a back leg sweep, however, the Russian forced Woolridge off of the lei tai (platform) twice in the second to win the round and consequently the match. On the third day of competition Khalid Pitcher battled Alex Cisne from the U.S. in a well fought two round match that ended with the American forcing Pitcher off of the lei tai twice in the second round.

Pitcher also forced his opponent once off the platform, but this was not enough to secure the victory.

Next the youngest member of the seven member squad, Reyel Bowen, took on Taras Gorobets from the Ukraine in a very tightly contested match that ended in a TKO victory for the Ukranian after Bowen took a hard leg kick to the outside of the knee and was unable to continue the match.

The 11th World Wushu Championships will be held in 2011 in Turkey.

The Bermuda team is also planning to compete at the eighth Pan American Wushu Championships in Argentina next year.

Bermuda Sanshou Association President Garon Wilkinson said: "I am very pleased with our athletes' performances during these championships.Every single one of us executed the game plan that our coaching team came up with and it was a simple matter of our opponents being better than us.

"There was not an issue of our athletes falling short of their standard.

"We will be paying very close attention to the semi-final and final matches trying to pick up as much expertise as possible. We continue to make ground on the rest of the world and eventually there has to become a point where the playing field evens out and then further down the road we leave everyone else behind."

---