Farnham School of Tae Kwon Do’s tournament squad returned from the GTI National Open Championships in Cheltenham with an impressive tally of 15 medals.

In a competition of high standards, all 13 of Farnham’s squad put in strong performances across the disciplines of patterns and sparring, winning five gold, two silver and eight bronze medals.

Farnham struck gold early in the day with 11-year-old Dylan Walker winning his patterns division while sisters Melissa and Nicole Oxley had to play-off for bronze in their patterns division, with Melissa narrowly prevailing over her younger sibling.

Will Bryan continued his medal-winning run in recent tournaments with bronze in his patterns division.

Farnham’s adult competitors performed well in patterns, with Rachel Nawrattel landing bronze in her division and Will Oxley winning gold after not one but three extra play-off rounds.

And Farnham’s success continued in the sparring with Dylan Walker winning his second gold of the day after a series of bouts that saw him progress to a final against his Farnham clubmate Miles Warner, with ten-year-old Miles having to be content with the silver medal.

Dylan’s sister, 13-year-old Eden Walker, was competing in her first national tournament and showed commendable spirit in winning a play-off for the bronze medal in her sparring division.

The Oxley sisters, Melissa and Nicole, also won medals in sparring; Melissa being narrowly defeated in the final to take home the silver, and Nicole winning the bronze medal play-off.

Three more sparring medals followed for Farnham; Will Bryan, Monty Warner and Rachel Nawrattel all taking bronze after narrowly missing out on the final in their respective divisions.

Oliver Contreras, showing great composure and control, saw off his opponents to win gold in his sparring division, adding the GTI National Open title to his PUMA International Open title won earlier this year.

The incredibly consistent and combative Will Oxley fought his way through a series of bruising encounters to win gold in the men’s over-40s sparring. Oxleyhas been defeated only once in his past nine tournaments in sparring (and that was in a final bout), winning eight gold and one silver since making his tournament debut in February 2017.

There were also creditable performances from Tyla Nawrattel, Daniel Lee (competing for the first time) and Dimitri Perricos (stepping up to the adult divisionfor the first time).

This was one of Farnham’s best recent tournament performances and shows the emerging promise and strength in depth of the squad. However, having enjoyed the success at Cheltenham, every member of the squad was back in training 24 hours later with coach Tim Ayres-Townshend as preparation started for the next tournament in November.