Scarborough care home resident wins gold at World Kickboxing Championships

Craig Sellers, from the Scarborough-based care home, won the Adaptive Kickboxing Gold medal at the ICO World Championships in Hull last month.

Craig’s fellow Park View resident Wayne Appleby was also a silver medallist.

Craig and Wayne, alongside their head coach Andy Desa and Park View Deputy Manager Clare Tomlinson have been pioneering an accessible version of kickboxing.

Adaptive Kickboxing, which was created in 2022, involves two fighters attempting to remove a ball attached by Velcro to their opponent's bib.

Fights last one minute and thirty seconds and for every time a fighter removes their opponent's ball, they gain a point.

Clare, a kickboxing enthusiast who has taken part in world championships with her two children, helped to establish this rule set with Andy Desa, and fellow black belt Lisa Dixon.

She said: “It’s incredible what Craig and Wayne have done to win these two medals. Never could I have imagined, when I suggested we encouraged our service users to take part in kickboxing, that we would have a world champion within Milewood!

“Even though he doesn’t have any sporting history, Craig is always willing to give things a go and now he’s got a gold medal to show for it!”

“It was amazing,” said Craig. “My mum celebrated loads, and I never take my medal off!”

The two fighters, Craig and Wayne, started Adaptive Kickboxing just over a year ago and take part in a kickboxing fitness session with Lisa once a week.

Andy said: “As a young lad I always wanted to be involved in something that gave everyone a chance to enjoy their lives.

"Where life wasn’t as kind to them, I wanted to show them how to dig in and help them to realise that they can achieve anything! Craig and Wayne are no different.

"They make such a difference to the club and I’m so proud of them both.”

In the run up to the World Championships, Andy contacted Andrew Hennessy, the President of the ICO, to organise an exclusive ‘Adaptive Kickboxing’ category.

This year’s world championships took place at Hull University and with increasing interest from all over the world – in particular Ukraine – attracted a substantial audience.

Next year’s World Championships will be taking place in Germany and with Craig keen to defend his gold medal, and Wayne eager to go one better than his silver, the pair are seeking sponsorships to allow them to make the trip.