McDonald on his way to world champion title
The 12-year-old black belt is first in open weight fighting, sparring as season nears end
Matthew McDonald, a local martial artist from Waterloo, has racked up an impressive list of achievements since he started practicing martial arts when he was five years old.
McDonald, who is now 12, received his junior black belt last year and has been winning competitions at both the national and international level. He started entering competitions when he was seven years old and did some local competitions before he began to focus more on the national and international ones.
This is the first full year that McDonald has competed as a black belt, and he has been competing in the North American Sport Karate Association (NASKA) circuit, which according to Matthew’s sifu (or master) — Julian Shamuon — is the most difficult circuit in the world.
“If you want to be the best of the best and you want to call yourself the best, you have to do NASKA because if you are winning NASKA, you can really call yourself successful in martial arts in terms of competition,” said Shamuon.
This year, McDonald is first in open weight fighting, first in sparring, third in weapons and fifth in forms on the NASKA world tour. Since he is a black belt, he is only competing against other black belts from around the world. He has also won three NASKA grand champion awards.
“Grand champion is where you win your fighting division and then you compete against the winner from another fighting division and the winner of that is considered the grand champion,” said Shamuon.
According to Rod McDonald, Matthew’s father, at each NASKA tourney, the athlete is given points and then they are tallied up. Since there are only two tournaments left this year — in Miami and Toronto — he is well on his way to being named a NASKA world champion for both sparring and open weight fighting.
Last year, McDonald received the NASKA national champion award for forms, weapons and sparring as a brown belt. Along with this achievement, he also won two gold medals at the International Congress of Martial Arts (ICOMA) Panama World Championship.
McDonald trains at Shamuon Generation of Martial Arts in Waterloo as well as at Hotshot Athletic in Cambridge. Sifu Shamuon, who has been his instructor since the beginning, has been training for 23 years. He said the Waterloo location opened up in 2006 and he recently opened Hotshot Athletic in 2017.
Shamuon said he named his facility Hotshot Athletic because that had been his nickname growing up. He said his bond is so special with McDonald because, when he was a yellow belt, they began to call him “the mini hotshot.”
Shamuon is the first to admit that when McDonald first started training, he wasn’t the most focused athlete, but he has been able to reach success because he is very coachable.
“When he started, this boy was the biggest space cadet you would ever meet in your life … he was so curious about everything, so anything that came into his vision, that’s where he would focus,” laughed Shamuon.
“But it was him being dedicated and loving it so much and having really awesome parents that were invested in bringing him to see me consistently, that led to the recipe for a successful athlete.”
Shamuon refers to McDonald as a hybrid athlete, as he doesn’t just perform one style. He knows Shaolin kung fu, but has also been trained in karate.
Therefore, he can perform multiple karate styles such as Goju-Ryu and he also uses sport karate weapons, mostly the bow.
McDonald said sifu Shamuon has really helped him.
“I think he’s helped me because when he was at the tournaments, he’s always cheering me on and … I felt that he was there for me if I didn’t know something. And he would always be OK to teach me again and he’s also very funny,” said McDonald.
McDonald has other notable achievements this year, as he was a gold medallist at the Ontario Winter Games in Orillia, where he competed in the traditional kung fu category. He also came home from the ICOMA world championship in Mexico winning a “triple crown,” meaning he took home a gold medal in weapons, forms and sparring at a single competition.
He also qualified for both the World Association of Kickboxing Organizations junior world championships in Italy which took place in July and the WAKO Pan-American championship in Mexico this month. However, he will not attend either of the competitions due to an appendectomy he had in the summer, which he has not fully recovered from.
McDonald trains six days a week and is also part of the National Martial Arts Council competitive team, along with Shamuon.
He has gotten the chance to travel to many places for tournaments such as Panama, Chicago, and Washington, D.C. In January, he will be travelling to Jamaica to be a part of Team Canada for the ICOMA competition. His father said they plan to do a European circuit next year.
McDonald said one day he hopes to own his own martial arts store with his friends and would also like to compete in the Pan Am Games and the Olympics.
He said kung fu has taught him a lot.
“I have learned dedication, politeness and confidence.”
Shamuon said it has been very rewarding seeing him succeed.
“Especially when their nickname comes from my own, you know you want to see them succeed and you do everything you can, and I’ve done everything I can, and will continue to do that as long as he is through my doors.”
Alana Thoman’s column appears Wednesdays.