Students with a local martial arts school are using a showcase to help raise some money that will go towards transportation costs to Ottawa for a national competition.
The Rocky Mountain Academy of Martial Arts (RMAMA) has five students that qualified for nationals in their respective classes at a provincial tournament in Fernie a few weeks ago, but the trip to Ottawa is quite a hit to the pocketbook.
With that in mind, RMAMA is putting on a fundraising evening to showcase the talents of their students, as the studio wants to raise $5,000 from now until nationals, which kicks off on May 8th.
“We’re just putting something together to entertain people, give people a taste of what we do here,” said RMAMA owner Joel Huncar. “We’re going to have some sparring matches between some of our fighters and some demos from some of our kids and that kind of stuff.
Cole McNulty, Tage Leiman, Dave Buckley Logan Robertson and Tyson Hirscher all qualified for nationals at a provincial tournament in Fernie a few weeks ago.
This will be the first time Huncar has taken his charges to a national event.
“Honestly, up until I opened this place, I only taught for self defense and discipline—I did it as a hobby kind of thing and this focus on sports and getting these kids to tournaments is a new thing for me so it’s opened up a whole new world for me, as a coach,” said Huncar.
“It’s been really interesting and really fun.”
The showcase will be hosted at the RMAMA gym on April 20th and tickets run for $10.