Evening Advertiser - 29th October 1987

	Oasis Higashi Karate club team during training. Included in the picture are: Robert Hemans, Sian Rees, and Joe Tully in the front, Bill Harvey, Phil Bentley, David Salmon and Mark Martin in the centre and at the back Paul Taylor and Pete Whitney, the chief instructor.

You have to hand it to him

Promising young karate champion David Salmon added to his haul of trophies with two first places in national championships at Reading.

David, 15, and clubmates from Swindon's Oasis Karate Club came away from the Higashi karate tournament with ten trophies.

A junior black belt David, of Conway Road, Eldene, has been marked down as an outstanding prospect by instructor Kathy Fellows.

David's mother Lynda said: "He puts quite a lot of time into karate. He does two nights a week at the Oasis, one night at the Highworth club and on Saturday mornings he takes a children's class at Maxwell Street. Sometimes on Monday nights he goes to a class at Moredon."

David, who weighs in at about eight and a half stones and fights in the over 5ft 6in category, has won the national title for his age group six times.

He came third in the British Karate Federation Championships against exponents of other types of karate.

A pupil at Dorcan School, David took up karate when he was nine. His father David is a brown belt who belongs to the Highworth club.

In the Reading tournament David took the junior title in the over 5ft 6in class when he beat team-mate Shane Fraser in the final.

His other first place came in the kata section when the Oasis A team of David, Paul Taylor and Phil Bentley were top.

Other Oasis winners were a first place for Joe Tully, Bill Harvey (a second), Rob Hemans (third), Mark Martin (second in the individual kata) and Sian Rees (first in the female section).