New Brunswick karate fighters return from Calgary with eight victories

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A New Brunswick karate team has returned from their trip to Alberta, where they won a national competition last week.

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Team New Brunswick won the 2024 Calgary Cup Karate Championship, competing against teams from across Alberta and British Columbia. Out of the 14 fighters New Brunswick sent to the competition, eight of them won their respective events.

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Led by Sensei Johnny LeBlanc, this marks Team New Brunswick’s fourth consecutive victory at this competition. He said they had five rookies join them for the competition, and three of them managed to return with first-place finishes.

“I was quite proud of the team, and they’ve been training hard for the last four months, never missing a week of training,” LeBlanc said. “On average, they all show up four or five times a week, even during Christmas break and March Break. I felt the pressure [in the] last couple of weeks, but we did even better than last year.”

LeBlanc said the 14 fighters who competed in Calgary included a wide age range – from children, teenagers and adults alike.

In regard to their sustained success at this tournament in the past few years, he said one strategy he tells his fighters is to be willing to switch techniques when one isn’t working.

This New Brunswick team comprises of fighters mainly from the southeast New Brunswick area, including Moncton, Dieppe, Memramcook and Grande-Digue.

In the adult category, André Barrieau finished first in fighting along with Nancy Richards who also won in fighting, and finished second in kata. Junior winners include Nathan Parker, Meka Cormier, Rémi Barrieau and Svelod Vinnick, who also won the Best Fighting Technique Award.

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Other junior participants are Tristan Ouellette, Noah Cormier and Rebecca Belogun. Oullette finished in second for fighting while Cormier and Belogun each placed in third.

The children category winners were Félix Barrieau and Zoe Richard. Oleksi Melnychenko, Annabelle Poirier and Lex LeBlanc also participated in Calgary.

Poirier finished second in both fighting and kata. Melnychenko was also second in fighting.

LeBlanc has more than 30 years of experience, and previously competed at the international level. He’s had two top 10 finishes at world tournaments, finishing eighth in 2003, and ninth and 2008. He ended his competing days in 2008.

Today, he runs LeBlanc Karate Dojo, teaching Kyokushin at seven locations in Moncton, Dieppe, Memramcook, Shediac and Cocagne. Kyokushin is a Japanese karate style that’s full-contact, and has been used by various martial artists, including Canadian UFC Hall of Famer Georges St-Pierre.

“I have a bit over 200 students, and it’s a good mix of kids, teenagers and adults,” he said.

LeBlanc also runs a couple other karate teams that compete at the North American and international levels.

He said in the past year alone, he’s taken fighters to compete in several competitions outside Canada, including Los Angeles and in Japan. Their next goal is to compete in an international tournament that will take place in Europe in 2025.

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