Report European Championship

You can hardly have missed it: this week was the European Championship No Gi in Rome. A large part of our coaching team traveled to the Italian capital to test themselves against the best in the world.

Joran was in one of the toughest brackets of the tournament, and had to win no less than 6 matches to call himself champion. He started well, despite having the hardest path to the top. He won all 6 matches and can finally call himself European champion. An enormous achievement from our young coach athlete. On the podium, he was promoted to purple belt.

Both Denner and Deyver (D1 and D2) managed to secure bronze in the brown belt categories Middle and Medium Heavy.

Enzo performed amazingly, and won gold in the same medium heavy brown belt category. He showed great jiu jitsu, and was constantly looking for the finish.

Amin managed to achieve a beautiful result with a silver medal in the purple belt master category despite a severe shoulder injury: silver.

Also Vitinho participated in the masters, but as a brown belt. He was down 0-6 but managed to turn it around to a 7-6 victory: gold!

Sarah won 2 tough matches in the purple belt featherweight category. In the semi-final, she faced a world champion, who turned out to be a size too big: bronze (despite having suffered a severe food poisoning).

Ashley participated in the master category, and won her first match but lost the second: also bronze.

Master Kevin showed his tremendous growth over the past months, and won his first two matches dominantly. Unfortunately, he lost the final to a good opponent: silver for Kevin. He also received his purple belt on the podium, just like Joran.

Marcelo Fausto fought his way to the final of the open class, while he is only a middleweight. He defeated several larger, heavier opponents. In the final, he faced Pawel Jaworski, the best nogi grappler at the moment. His strategy worked well, but Pawel only needed a small opening to find the submission: silver for Fausto.

The medals of the athletes were enough for a 5th place in the team rankings. What a great debut for The House International, already competing with the top just a month after its founding.

Daniel, Kate, Annika, Arief, Ralph, Estelle, Kamen, Jivi, Alwin, Noor and Amar fought hard but all go home without a medal. So many beautiful results, but also a lot to work on. Next year, we aim for the podium as a team, and the preparation for that starts today.