On Friday 1st March, Sensei Matthew Yardy travelled to Salzburg, Austria to compete at the first WKF Series A of the year. The Series A is an international competition which is open to all WKF affiliates to compete and gain world ranking points in the hope of qualifying for the 2020 Olympic Games.
Matthew competed on the Friday was among the first group of kata competitors to perform in front of judges using the new point systems to judge kata rather than flags. Matthew performed the kata Unsu and managed to come 12th in his pool of 17 competitors. Unfortunately, only the top 4 advanced to the next round but it was safe to say that Matthew performed well on his first outing against 285 competitors in his category and with some of the best karateka in the world.