World championship success for Scarborough martial arts academy
Desapline took home 62 medals
A Scarborough martial arts academy is celebrating success after taking 62 medals at a world championships.
Members of Desapline took part in the event over the weekend in Hungary.
Andy Desa, head coach and owner, said: "We took a team of 21 competitors from Desapline which was part of the England team and there was about 100 competitors from England. The youngest fighter was eight years-old and the oldest was 53. We got 27 gold, 23 silvers and 13 bronze.
"It's out of this world. I've been coaching for about 30 years now and it's the pinnacle of my career. As a coach it's just fantastic. We crowned 10 world champions, We took medals in the semi-contact, the taekwondo forms, the karate forms and the light contact.
"I push the fighters. All my life I've been fighting and it just took a lot of time to decide to stop as a fighter after 12 world titles to become a coach because I wanted to still compete. The way I got around it was teaching fighters to be proper competition fighters. It's psychologically preparing the fighters as well as physically.
"I would presume the medals will grow as the team grows. We're a family and that's the way I work. We travel together, we fight together, we eat together, we go out together and they all have each other's backs. When you see the kids sat there in big arenas messing about then all of a sudden they get their war faces on, get on the mats and they're a different animal."