11 & Under Hard & Soft Creative Weapons (N-39)
Surprisingly, neither of the top two players sported either kama or long bo this year. In his last year of 11 and under, Jaime Nakamura’s sword form came alive as he topped the division with newcomer, nine year old Chris Glandon. Glandon performed creative nunchaku being left one one-hundredth behind in the eliminations. In the Grand Finale Nakamura increased the scoring gap slightly to win his first weapons title. Nakamura represents Sasaki Kenpo and Glandson of Wayne Nguyen's TKO in Texas. With two years left in the division, Glandon will be tough to beat. Seth Boyette of Georgia broke a tie breaker to win third, an identical position to his 2005 competition.

12 to 14 Male Hard & Soft Creative Weapons (N-40)
Last year’s champion, Jordan Simon of California, was bumped into third after losing an eliminations tie breaker against Jorge Martinez for second place seeding. Unprecedented in junior weapons competition, another sword routine reached the gold medal status. Alex Pye of Corky Sikes Team Strike Force handily topped Martinez’ bo routine in the Grand Finale awarding him with his first sport karate world title. Martinez is from Guatemala while Pye takes up residence in Georgia, USA.

15 to 17 Male Hard & Soft Creative Weapons (N-41)
Reigning champion Justin Lewis dominated the eliminations again this year with his usual dynamic long bo presentation. Meanwhile AJ Maunder broke a tie with Josh Bailey for second place giving him one more opportunity to face Lewis for the title on stage in the Grand Finale. But this was to no avail as Lewis convincingly won again. Maunder however has one year left in the division as Lewis and Bailey move into the adult ranks next year. And if all those moving into adult show up next year the competition shall be quite fierce. Lewis is from Virginia and represents Edwin Alejandro’s EWO. Maunder is from Team Langley’s and Josh Bailey from Rick Lee’s SMA.

11 & Under Hard & Soft Choreo Musical Weapons (N-42)
Neither of the 11 year old Aguilar twin brothers Jose or Federico, made it into the top three places in this year’s creative weapons division placing fourth and seventh respectively. But with choreographed music both rose to world class status, Jose topped the division 29.97 and Federico tied both Pressley of Team Strike Force fame and Jaime Nakamura of Sasaki Kenpo. In one of those rare three way ties (surprisingly enough there was also a tie for 5th, 6th and 7th place) brother Federico slid by Pressley leaving him in third and Nakamura in fourth place. In another surprise win, the sword wielding Federico, who could have wound up in fourth, topped his brother 49.94 to 49.91 in the Grand Finale for his first world title. I wonder if they still exhibit brotherly love? They are students of Edgar Cordova’s Schumann’s Kenpo Karate in Guatemala.

12 to 14 Hard & Soft Choreo Musical Weapons (N-43)
“Never give up” should be Jordan Simon’s motto... Nothing played out the way Simon had envisioned it. On the first full day of the Super Grands he lost in Japanese taking third. On the second day, matters seemed to worsen as he placed two more thirds in his reigning world title divisions of creative weapons and traditional weapons and was destined for one more third place in Korean forms the next day. His saving grace was Grand Finale qualifiers with the runner-up seeding in choreographed musical weapons to Jorge Martinez and a tied eliminations seeding in open musical weapons with Alex Pye. The Grand Finale that evening must have started out agonizing for him as well, as he watched others replace him as the new world champions in creative and traditional weapons divisions. Perhaps it was those losses and his underdog status against Martinez in this division that he pulled out all the stops as “world champion or bust”. He exploded and executed his best performance to date pulling off the highest score of the 2007 Super Grands with a perfect 50.00 which also qualified him for the new overall Grand. From there he went for broke again three days later in the overall Grand. He wielded his long bo to win the overall junior creative grand and tied for the highest score in the overall grand at 49.99 with the adult overall grandchampion winner and took the coveted red metallic belt. He trains under Butch Togisala in Escobar, California. Alex Pye of Georgia took third.

15 to 17 Hard & Soft Choreo Musical Weapons (N-44)
To round out the musical divisions, the 15 to 17 year olds also exhibited a tie for first place. Former weapons champions Justin Lewis and Joseph Pruiett tied for the top two spots, Lewis with his long bo and Pruiett with his nunchaku. Lewis won the run-off and subsequently the world title by five one-hundredths. Both players represented Team GOP with Edwin Alejandro as instructor for Lewis and Bear Loebe for Pruiett. Josh Bailey of South Carolina took third for the second year in a row.

Junior Hard & Soft Open Musical Weapons (N-45)
Sharing all five of the first place national seeds between them, Jordan Simon and Alex Pye tied in the eliminations leaving Carlos Ayala of Schumann’s Martial Arts in Guatemala in third. Using the weapons they are known for, Pye with sword and Simon with long bo, both players gave another excellent contest to music with Simon winning his second world title of the Games. He represents Team GOP coached by Chris Gallio while Pye is one of Corky Sikes protegees from Georgia.

12 to 14 Female Hard & Soft Creative Weapons (N-46)
In the weapons department Mia Caldwell was feeling rather secure with a 29.97 to 29.94 eliminations victory over Kristin Tupper. But in the Grand Finale it was a different story as she went down in defeat 49.95 to 49.90. Both players wielded kama, Tupper representing Corky Sikes Team Strike Force from Georgia and Caldwell representing Team GOP from Texas.

15 to 17 Female Hard & Soft Creative Weapons (N-47)
Not unlike her prowess in the female creative division, Samantha Wolfort of Corky Sikes’ Team Strike Force also persevered in weapons utilizing her long bo. She outperformed the difficult double whip chain by Gabby Turner by only one one-hundredth in the eliminations, but by five one-hundredths in the Grand Finale to win this year’s title. She hails from Georgia while Turner trains under Darren Cox in Utah. Florida’s Tanya Hunt of Team CKD under coach Chuck Elias took third.

Men’s Hard Creative Weapons (N-48)
Joshua Durbin is an enigma all to himself. One never knows what he’ll dream up next and if there’s a dare I’m sure he’ll figure out a way to pull it off. He did some pretty wild aerial maneuvering while wielding his long bo to win both the eliminations and the Grand Finale trumping this year’s adult weapons title in his first adult year and topping Corky Sikes. He hails as a proud anchor of the Unison schools under Steve Amaro in Colorado. Corky represents his own Team Strike Force from Georgia. Veteran Jeffrey Doss of Virginia took third.

Adult Hard Choreographed Musical Weapons (N-49)
With weapons world titles in 1998, 1999, 2005 and 2006, Edgar Cordova was back again with his kama on rope with the form named “Anything is Possible”, which, with Cordova, was true. He topped his “team forms” partner Corky Sikes with the second highest eliminations score of 29.99 to Sikes’ 29.97. Again with his kama to Sikes’ sword he won the Grand Finale for his fifth weapons world title. He’s a member of Schumann’s Karate in Guatemala while Sikes is from Jesup, Georgia, USA. Jerico Catura of Team DDX took third.

Adult Soft Contemporary Weapons (N-50)
Roark Hodson won his second title of the Games wielding a Chinese sword and topping Tyler Harris’ Chinese spear form. After only beating Harris in the eliminations by three one-hundredths, he trounced him in the Grand Finale 49.97 to 49.91. Hodson trains under Myong Oh in Utah and Harris under Wang Tao in Dallas, Texas.

Women’s Hard Creative Weapons (N-51)
First year adult, Lauren Ferguson couldn’t top Ashley Davies’ weapons performance in the eliminations, but she became one of fourteen reversals loosing the eliminations and then coming back to win the Grand Finale for the world title. Her rebound was by a five one-hundredths margin. She hails from Ron and Sharon’s Team FX in Virginia while Davies trains with Brandon Hastings of the Unison schools in Victorville, California. Carrie Goldbeck of North Carolina took third.

Senior Hard Contemporary Weapons (N-52)
The senior division was whistling Dixie as players from Virginia, North Carolina and Georgia monopolized the top three spots. Ronnie Ferguson of Virginia edged out Ervic Aquino of California in a tie for third place while Johnny Watkins of North Carolina and Corky Sikes of Georgia battled out the title in the Grand Finale. With a 49.96 to 49.93 score, Sikes took the title held by Ferguson last year. Sikes hails from Jesup, Georgia, where an English dialect is spoken, and Johnny Watkins lives in North Wilkesboro, North Carolina.

TRADITIONAL WEAPONS TITLES

11 & Under Hard Traditional Weapons (N-53)
Reigning champion Sage Northcutt took the lead again this year comfortably winning the eliminations and leaving Jaime Nakamura (third place in 2005) and Michelle Sims (second in 2006) in a tied second place position. Nakamura won the tied run-off and in a stunning upset topped Northcutt 49.93 to 49.91 in the Grand Finale for one of his three victories this year. Nakamura lives in California, Northcutt in Texas and Sims in Utah.

12 to 14 Hard Traditional Weapons (N-54)
Colbey Northcutt took one one-hundredth of a point loses to Jordan Simon in the eliminations this year and for this same title last year. But they ran neck to neck with each other in the national conference point races this year, Northcutt winning three, Simon one and tied for another and each within two points in the ratings of each other. But this year at the Grands another factor came into play as Justin Lantaigne with a mere first place regional seed bumped Simon out of the contest and placed one one-hundredth behind Northcutt in the eliminations. With a showdown set for the Grand Finale, scoring was identical to last year’s 49.93 to 49.92, but with a world of difference for Northcutt as she held the higher of the two scores this time awarding her with her first traditional weapons title. Northcutt lives in Katy, Texas, USA and Lantaigne in Sudbury, Ontario, Canada

15 to 17 Hard Traditional Weapons (N-55)
Anyone that believes that there is better or more competitive competition than the Super Grands has obviously never attended. This division was once again proof of Super Grands difficulty that the Judges faced in choosing a champion as only one one-hundredth separated most of each of the top eight contestants. And if it wasn’t one one-hundredths it was virtual ties as happened in the daytime eliminations between reigning champion Sergio Calva of Mexico and Torren Davis of North Carolina. The run-off left Davis in the lead and set the precedent for the Grand Finale where Davis once again topped Calva by one one-hundredth for a title he last won in 2004 in the 12 to 14 year old division. He, along with third place winner Mike Spizzuco, are members of Allen Torres’ and Pat Premdas Team RCU. Calva is a member of Team GOP.

Adult Hard Traditional Weapons (N-56)
It would be hard to deny that Cody Hackman and Brandon Bertsch weren’t the best traditional weapons competitors the last couple of years. Bertsch upset reigning champion Hackman last year by one one-hundredth to win the title. This year after a one one-hundredth eliminations win by Hackman, the pair tied in the Grand Finale. A second round left Hackman regaining the title and bringing it back to Canada, the country that has retained the tile every year since 2000 excepting Bertsch victories in 2003 and 2006. Bertsch resides in Albany, Oregon, USA and Hackman in London, Ontario, Canada. Joshua Page of Hickory, North Carolina took third.