By Declan Lloyd
Mahamed Mohsen, a 20-year-old DMU student and a black belt in taekwondo, won the UK Taekwando Group competition, which took place in Kettering last Thursday.
He won all of his five fights on his way to winning the competition.
Mahamed said: “There was a lot of good competition today; I am pleased that I won.
“I worked really hard for a number of years to achieve this, it just shows that hard work pays off.”
Mr Mohsen added: “I am really looking forward to moving to the next step in taekwondo competitions, I feel really confident.”
Mahamed started taekwondo when he was 10 years old and got his black belt at the age of 16.
He trained at the El Gar centre in Northampton and currently trains for five hours every week.
Now he is looking to start a taekwondo club of his own in Leicester, having had previous experience teaching taekwondo to adults and children at the El Gar centre.
He was critical, however, of the DMU taekwondo society as it follows the ITF (International Taekwondo Federation) style, which would require him to start again from white belt.
He said: “After approaching the society I spoke to one of the instructors and expressed an interest in joining, he told me that I would have to start again from white belt, negating my previous 10 years of experience.
“Unfortunately there is no way to transition a belt from one style to another.”
