Ana Lara has been attending Ramacrisna judo classes since the end of 2021. Now, she has received the gold medal at the Minas Gerais State School Games
Ramacrisna made history once again. This time in sport. The institute’s judo team won six medals in the state stage of the Minas Gerais School Games (JEMG). Including the gold of Ana Lara, who was classified for the national championship, called Youth School Games.
In addition, the Institute was the male and female module 1 champion in this sport. The Ramacrisna judo instructor, Caliton Silva Santos, says that this is an unprecedented result for Betim, the city where the institute is based.
Learn more about this achievement.
This is how the instructor defines the competition. Caliton explains that it was the first competition for many Ramacrisna students. “We arrived without knowing the size of our level, and the children behaved very well. They met a giant club in Uberaba and participated in the opening ceremony with more than 700 cities”, he summarizes.
Caliton says that the Institute has never held an internal judo competition, even for lack of infrastructure. Until then, only one friendly was held, last year, in which there was no coordination of weight, separation of boys and girls.
Official competitions began in 2022. In April, the team took part in the first tournament. The second, called Judô Futuro, had the participation of 14 athletes. Now, at JEMG, there were 11 athletes competing, who won seven medals.
In addition to the team’s success, it is the chance for young athletes to be inspired by professional names who participated in the competition at the beginning of their careers. This is the case of Olympic judo triple medalist Mayra Aguiar and runner Paulo André, who has already been runner-up in athletics.
“I believe that their participation opens up a new horizon, with the vision they had of a new city, of a journey. They saw that there are barriers beyond Betim, that the world is beyond our city. The students also surpassed their limits and showed that they can achieve results that even scare us”, pointed out Caliton.
In addition to sport, the instructor also states that the main objective with judo is to train not only good athletes, but also good citizens. The goal is for students to build their professional paths ethically and responsibly. “Medals come, but our main objective is to form the champion of life, on and off the mat”, says Caliton.
At just 11 years old, Ana Lara anxiously awaits the arrival of the national stage of the competition. But despite taking training seriously, for her, the dispute will be an opportunity to be able to do something she’s never done: travel by plane and get to know another state.
The girl says that she started judo at the end of 2021 and that this was the third competition in which she participated. “It was a lot of fun,” she said.
In addition to judo, Ana participated in the Ramacrisna chess team. For her, the board game is her second favorite sport, after judo. “I really like fighting. It’s the second fight I practice, I’ve also done capoeira. I find judo very interesting. It’s good because I wasn’t working much on my physical part and that’s not good for my health,” she says.
Passionate about fights, Ana Lara knows that the presence of a girl in the environment can displease some men. “They think we’re weak, but I don’t care what they think,” she said..
The national stage of school games does not yet have a defined date or location..
Ramacrisna is a non-profit institution that, for more than 60 years, has been developing projects in the area of leisure, culture, vocational courses and learning for socially vulnerable children, adolescents and adults in 13 cities in the Metropolitan Region. In addition to sports workshops, such as judo, field soccer and society, and dances, such as ballet and capoeira.
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