Chennise Charles recently accomplished a feat no other woman has done for many years when she dethroned longstanding champion, Nicole Lambie, en route to a national senior kata and kumite double in the rigorous women's 18-34 division.
A two-time T&T Karate Union (TTKU) nominee for the First Citizens Sports Foundation Sportswoman of the Year award, Charles represented the Shotokan Karate International Federation of T&T (SKIFTT) in fine style for the two gold medals at the TTKU National Championship at the Maloney Indoor Sports Arena. The event took place two weekends ago.
Making the 21-year-old athlete's double-gold even more impressive was the fact that she competed at a separate event, the Taekajudo tournament in Tacarigua a day prior, where she won the kata discipline in the same women's 18-34 age division.Charles would have also gone for the double on Saturday, but said she opted out of kumite to rest her injured knee for the following day's national championship.
Clearly buoyed by her most recent achievements, the national athlete explained what it took for her to win the two national titles."Firstly courage," said Charles. "I was really nervous because my competitor (Lambie) had a reputation as the kata champion in T&T for many years, so I really just decided that I was going to represent my club with a high level of performance. I also said that I was going to give my all with or without (the best use of) my injured knee."
Charles said her goal this year is to be consistent in each tournament she enters. "And I wanted to start off with a win, and so I did."She described her instructor, Sensei Neville Mason, as her inspiration and her driving force to win. "(Sensei Mason) is always my inspiration because he trains me as though I have no limits and always reminds me to stay humble, and so, I always want to win for him."
Asked which discipline, kata or kumite, provides a greater challenge for her in competition, Charles replied: "They are equally challenging for me. I'll slow down like Tai Chi. Whichever kata I specialise in, I make it my own," adding, "Kumite, however, takes timing and distancing. In competition, kata is always performed first, so I try to focus on that first, then I focus on kumite afterward.
But for me, it goes hand In hand. My sensei always taught me to balance both and it's very rare you see persons my age competing in both divisions. People tend to branch off to either kata or kumite at the elite level but I choose to balance it for as long as I can."
Her past is colourful in martial arts having represented T&T in a number of countries, namely Greece, the US and St Lucia, not to mention the birthplace of karate, Japan, in her first Shotokan Karate-Do International Federation (SKIF) World Championships, at just 15 years old.
She preferred to keep reserved on her immediate plans for competition, but divulged something she otherwise longs for.
"My ultimate dream is for karate to get into the Olympics. If it does in 2020, I'll be 27 and would have gained more experience and knowledge of my art. Between now and that time I'd like to continue my travels, competing at the highest level and representing my country. I'd like to think that I'll be at my peak at that age because I still have so much to improve on."
"Happily, karate is never-ending for all. I can be a world champion even after I've reached my fifties."Charles identified two instructors from her dojo, Giselle Laronde-West (T&T and Miss World winner, 1986) and Cindy Guevara, as prime examples of the senior athletes who continue to excel.
Laronde-West and Guevara both attended the US Open in Las Vegas, Nevada, with success in their respective divisions. "We look up to them at the dojo and we hope to be able to perform karate in the future as well as they do. So, one doesn't simply retire from karate, unless they choose to or unless they have to. It's a lifestyle and I intend on it being part of my life forever."