SAMURAI Judo Club has a new black belt player after Lewis Mills not only won the gold medal at the Rod Lane Senior Open Championships at the club, but he also gained the points he needed to make the grade.

The son of one of the club’s longest serving coaches, fifth level black belt and World Masters medalist Ian Mills, Lewis, aged 25, did some judo as a child but came back with much greater interest a few years ago.

He decimated the opposition, winning his first contest in just 34 seconds, his second contest in just two seconds and a third in 54 seconds to take the gold in the men’s higher grades under 81 kilos.

Also in the men’s higher grades, Dan Matei gained his first points towards his black belt with two good wins which also secured him a bronze medal, whilst Lucas Kent, in the lighter weight group, did not reach the medals but had a good win against a Sheffield player.

In the men’s lower grades, Ryan Killworth was on excellent form. He started with wins against higher grades from Sheffield and Bristol to put himself into the quarter-finals, where he beat a Bangor player, again by maximum points. This put him into the semi-finals where he was unfortunately caught by a good throw from a Birmingham player. One final win gave him the bronze medal.

In the ladies’ lower grades, Emma Martin was making her competition debut and finished with a bronze. However, it was in the ladies’ higher grades that the older Samurai girls, as usual, really made their mark.

Sophie Deeming-Lane moved up two weight categories to compete at under 70 kilos and still won all three of her contests against brown belts from Bath, Bangor and Bristol by maximum points, not only winning the gold medal to taking her to fifty points already towards her black belt, despite only gaining her senior brown two months ago. Olivia Turner then did the same in the over 70 kilos, despite being far lighter than her opponents, winning three contests by maximum points to take the gold and take her onto sixty points towards her black belt now, despite again only having had her senior brown belt for a couple of months.

Sophie then added a further silver medal in the ladies’ open category to complete a very good day for the club.

During the men’ section, Olivia Turner was refereeing and successfully passed her senior referee assessment. This now makes four young Samurai referees recently qualified, as she joins Nathan Gallacher, Matt Hemer and Sophie Deeming-Lane as the top young referees in the county, all from Samurai. Becky Hobby, who qualified a year ago, completes the list.