Over 80 judoka from across Britain and Europe came together for an exciting day’s action at the world famous Stoke Mandeville Stadium for the British Judo Special Needs Championship on Saturday 29 August.

Competitors ranged from club judo players to international athletes from Germany and the Netherlands and members of the Great Britain Special Needs team, a number of whom had competed at the Special Olympics World Games in Los Angeles in July.

After being led in a warm up by GB VI squad members Chris Skelley and Jack Hodgson, both medallists at this year’s IBSA World Games, the judoka got to work including Louie Titre of ‘Red Belt Louie’ fame who was competing in his first ever judo competition.

On the day members of the GB Special Needs team proved to be the big winners taking home 12 gold and five silver medals in total though Rush Judo Club also bagged a number of medals across the board.

Gold medallists included GB squad member Skye Westwood who said she was “proud and happy to have won” on the day and Special Olympics World Games silver medallist Chris Murphy.

Speaking after winning gold, the Glasgow athlete said: “Today’s competition was really good, I had a couple of hard fights, good opponents, good numbers turned up so very difficult event to win today.”

Full results will be published in due course

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