Titles roll in to Causeway Club

The club capped off a remarkable couple of months by scooping an incredible medal haul at the Northern Ireland Judo Youth Games in Londonderry recently.

All three of head coach Alan Ashcroft’s sons - Cameron, Curtis and Jacob - took gold in the advanced section.

In the novice section Ballybogey’s Ben Walker and Dervock’s Demi Whitfield took gold.

Caleb Bartlett and Connor Phillips put in tenacious displays to take silver in the advanced section.

Gracious and Stewart Phillips took bronze in the advanced section while Brandon Boyd and Stephen Park also took bronze in the novice section with Dervock lad Boyd narrowly missing out on silver.

Alan told Times Sport he was delighted with the performance of his fighters.

“Credit to all of them,” he said.

“I was very proud of the work they put in and the way they conducted themselves and competed on the day.

“They were up against the cream of the sport from across Northern Ireland and showed they are more than a match for anyone.

“The future of the club and its members is extremely bright.”

The Ashcroft brothers’ gold-medal winning exploits in the Maiden City follow similar success at the Northern Ireland Open and Closed Championships for wrestling as well as the North West Open for judo.

The Causeway Judo Club now runs classes in freestyle wrestling and submission grappling which have proved extremely popular locally.

Meanwhile, if your New Year’s resolution is to get fit then you can’t pick a better way to do it than through judo, according to Alan.

“Why not come along to training and learn new skills whilst getting a great workout doing it?” he said.

The club trains on Tuesday and Thursday night in the Castle Community Centre, Ballymoney - juniors from 7-8pm and seniors 8-9.30pm.

There is an additional class in Dervock Community Centre on Saturday at 12.00pm.

For more information call Alan on 07835 575 328.