Vicky Yates
World and European Champion
Vicky Yates
World and European Champion
Position: Senior Instructor NKMA
Senior NKMA Instructor
3rd Dan Karate
1st Dan Kick Boxing
Experience: 20 Years Martial Arts Experience
Vicky Yates
biography
Training Background and Competition Success
Vicky is a hugely frequent visitor to NKMA dojos and one of our most dedicated and loyal students. Whilst Vicky has only trained at NKMA for 7 or 8 years, her karate journey started much earlier.
Vicky began training at the age of 19 with the legendary late Pauline Bindra 8th Dan, well known for being the world’s highest ranking female karateka. After 4 years of hard work Vicky moved to train under the style of Ishinryu with Richard Condon 5th Dan, who was well renowned for having a brilliant understanding of how to train the human body and an extremely keen eye for detail. Vicky competed successfully with Richard for 8 years, becoming Ishinryu Champion in kata in 1997 and also 1998. After taking a short break, she moved over to the expertise of Saj De Silva 5th Dan – shortly after the opening of his NKMA dojos.
Vicky has always been a highly successful and tenacious competitor, with an iron-clad mindset and a determination and committment to excellence than many would find it hard to match. She has transferred those skills into her coaching and has become one of NKMA’s most prized and important assets. Training 6 days a week, training alone at home in her gym and on the local roads, she now is now well recognised as one of the best dual-discipline female veteran athletes on the competition circuit.
Her rise to that level has been steady, methodical and sustained with national medals in both kata and kumite in the 2013 and 2014 EKF English championships and more recently to her first international medal in the female veterans team kumite at the WUKF world championships in Dublin 2016. This was closely followed by international medals in WUKF World’s in 2018 and WUKF European’s of the same year. Vicky aspires to compete for those medals again in the up and coming international tournaments to be held in Poland, Italy and Brazil, 2020 and 2021 respectively.
A local school teacher in her full time job – she carries a wealth of experience working with hundreds of different children over the last few decades in a highly successful teaching carrier that focuses primarily on working with children who are impaired by significant difficulties – including qualifications to assist those with special educational needs.
Achievements and Qualifications
Karate 3rd Dan
Kick Boxing 1st Dan
English United Karate Federation England International
Emergency First Aid Qualification
Fully Insured
Enhanced DBS Check
Qualified Child and Adolescent Counsellor
Mindfulness Qualification
Specialist Training in Special Educational Needs
British Sign Language Qualification
Qualifications Currently Undertaking
Qualification in Teaching and Training
Competition Successes
Ishinryu Kata Champion 1997, 1998
Southern Open Kata Champion 2013
EKF English Bronze Medallist Kata 2013
EKF English Silver Medallist Kumite 2014
EKF English Silver Medallist Kata 2014
Southern English Kata Champion 2016
Essex Open Kata Champion 2016
International London Kata Open Champion 2017
BASK Kata Open Champion 2019
English Karate Club Kata Champion 2018 2019
EUKF Kata Champion 2019
International
Team Kumite Bronze Medallist, WUKF World Championships, Dublin 2016
Individual Kumite Bronze Medallist, WUKF World Championships, Dundee 2018
Individual Kumite Bronze Medallist, WUKF European Championships, Malta 2018
Team Kumite Bronze Medallist, WUKF European Championships, Malta 2018
Individual Awards
Ishinryu Senior Student of the Year 1997
NKMA True Martial Artist Award 2017
NKMA Senior Student of the Year 2013
NKMA Student of the Decade 2009-2019