The Cayman Islands Taekwondo Federation sent 12 young competitors to the Amateur Athletic Union Taekwondo Gold Coast Championship, in Miami, Florida, with each athlete returning to Cayman with a medal.
“We had about 40 clubs throughout the US that came out; our little island came out with 24 medals, and I am super proud of them all,” Naidelys Eden-Henry, CITF vice president, told the Cayman Compass at Owen Roberts International Airport when the athletes returned on Monday, 24 April.
The taekwondo championship featured a total of 523 competitors from across North America, including specially invited nations like Cayman. It served as a qualifier for the US National Championship, where every athlete representing the 345 made the cut.
“The national competition will determine who is in the USA national team, but because we are not American [we are not eligible], but just to know that we are good enough to qualify in such a big country, goes to show what we are doing,” Eden-Henry said.
The Cayman athletes did not have any prior international experience, making their collective performance even more impressive, she said.
“None of them had ever been to an international competition,” she said. “With over 2,000 spectators – the crowd was just exhilarating – and a lot of them were intimidated, seeing someone who may look bigger or faster, but we sat them down and we told them, do your best.”
One of those athletes, Chloie Sahadeo, overcame her nerves when facing her opponents, winning a gold in forms and a silver in sparring.
“This (pointing at the Cayman crest on her shirt) represents something, and I am proud of myself for bringing these medals home to my island,” Sahadeo told the Compass. “For sparring, I was a little scared because there was a girl taller than me… but I still did it because I wanted a second medal, and I got it.”
Building on the team’s success in the US, Eden-Henry said it’s time to get the local community behind the athletes, with hopes of developing a future Olympian.
“Our goal as a federation is to increase the knowledge [of taekwondo] throughout the island,” she said. “We want everyone to know about it. It’s a sport that teaches self-defence and teaches the kids to have confidence and it helps throughout their lives.
“We want to start inviting international clubs to come down and make something big about it… We’ve been working closely with the minister of sports, because this is an opportunity for one of our athletes to get to the Olympics.”
Sports Minister Bernie Bush greeted the athletes at the airport as they came home Monday. He told the Compass that he was pleased to see how the athletes have progressed, noting that Cayman has a bright future in the sport of taekwondo.
“This is a beginning,” Bush said. “I hope the public will see that the taekwondo federation is something that you can get your children into. We now have a world champion, we have multiple records at CARIFTA, and this is where it all begins, at the grassroots level.”
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