Sports
Marlborough Taekwondo School To Send 4 Athletes To U.S. Team Trials
The athletes are often training six days a week leading up to the trials.
MARLBOROUGH, MA — Four local athletes are heading to the U.S. Team Trials for Taekwondo in Tulsa, Oklahoma, at the end of January.
Tae Jun Lee, Kieran Lee, Ariana Yap, and Kian Shah will compete for a spot on the US Taekwondo National Team for the World Championships in Athens, Greece, next year. Kwon’s Martial Arts head coach, Viet Nguyen, and other coaches at the local studio are working to send students to the competition.
“Leading up to team trials, we've been doing doubleheader sessions,” Shannon Blair, a parent and soon-to-be minority owner at Kwon's, told Patch.
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The athletes heading to Tulsa, aged 11 to 14, are often training six days a week leading up to the trials, and that pace will continue as the 2026 competition season, which runs through September, kicks off.
To qualify for the national team trials, athletes have to be a black belt medalist at the U.S. Open Taekwondo Championship or the U.S. National Taekwondo Championships.
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Three of the athletes competing next month medaled at the National Championship, while a fourth medaled at the Open Championships.
Kwon’s, which has been in operation for over 30 years, offers classes for students of all ages and skill levels, from beginners to elite. There are no tryouts, and about 30 kids will compete this season. Some will head to local tournaments to compete, depending on their willingness and availability.
“Anybody can join the competition team and then go to compete at whatever level they want,” Blair told Patch. “Obviously, some athletes are new to it, like my daughter's competing for the first time this year, and then there's other athletes that have been at this for many, many years.”
Blair added that she got her son started in Taekwondo in 2020, when he was in first grade. She said the most important part for her has been the community it brought him.
“Being on the team last year for my son, it was just a real community,” Blair told Patch. “The thing that’s also great is these kids are different ages… It’s just a great thing to see an 18-year-old bonding with an 11-year-old.”
Kwon's was recently recognized as a top Taekwondo school in Massachusetts by WT/USAT Data and Facts, an unofficial but community-focused analysis of World Taekwondo and U.S. Taekwondo.
“Being recognized as one of the top schools in Massachusetts is a testament to the culture that’s built here and it’s really the athletes who believe in us that made this happen," said Master Nguyen.
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