Meghan Booyens kept her chance to qualify for next year's Olympic Games in Tokyo alive over the weekend when she won a bronze medal at the African Karate Championships in Gaborone.
The Tuks karateka feels OK about how she had performed in the over-68kg kumite category. The important thing is that she has earned a valuable 450 rankings points. Last year she also won bronze at the African Championships.
Booyens's first opponent in Gaborone was Sanae Amirouch (Morocco). She considers it to be one of her better fights.
"I was able to dominate from the first moment and got two good kicks into the body, which helped me to win 8-0.
"I can only blame myself for what happened during my semi-final encounter against Cameroon's Blandine Angama. I made a mistake early on during our fight. Angama was quick to capitalise on it, scoring three points. Try as I may, I could not recover from then on."
Angama who won a bronze medal during last year's Karate World Championships in Kigali went on to take silver in Gaborone losing to Jami Chahnez (Tunisia) in the final.
Booyens impressed during her bronze medal bout against Irene Bechane (Mozambique). With quick thinking, she managed to score a takedown early on during the fight. It is is a technique that involves off-balancing an opponent bringing them to the ground with the attacker landing on top. The Tuks karateka never relented and kept on to dominate to win 7-2 eventually.
At the moment, she is not too sure as to when she will compete internationally again. It might be during the African Games (16-30 August) in Rabat. If not her next tournament will be in September when she will fighting at a Premier League Tournament in Tokyo.
The other South African karatekas who medalled in their respective kumite-categories are Aimee Harding (silver), Marinda Roets (silver), Lee-Robyn Poole (silver), Jaden Niemack (silver), Zahra Kader (bronze), Tyrone Gray (bronze) and Morgan Moss (bronze).
Maxime Willemse won a bronze medal in the kata-category.
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