Most elite Island athletes who are internationals have the 2020 Olympic Games in Tokyo as their ultimate goal.
For Olivia Brodie, the dream extends far beyond that, to the 2024 Paris and 2028 Los Angeles Summer Olympics.
That is because the 12/13-year-old, 35-kilo karate national champion is only in Grade 7 at Cedar Hill Middle School in Saanich.
“If Olivia stays focused, absolutely her prime will be at Los Angeles in 2028,” said her coach, Richard Mosdell, chief instructor at Kenzen Sports Karate.
Brodie’s international journey has already begun. With her Karate Canada national title, won last week in Halifax, comes a berth into the Pan American junior championships in Rio de Janeiro in August.
“Olivia is so unassuming that you would never know she is that tough. But she is so mentally tough,” said Mosdell, who is also high performance director for Karate B.C.
Brodie became national champion in her age class for kumite, or sparring, but also won the silver medal in kata, or forms, and will represent Canada in both at the junior Pan Ams.
“It’s rare to do both kumite and kata at the national and international levels,” Mosdell said.
The Kenzen club, in Royal Oak, produced the bookends at the recent Karate Canada national championships, from the pint-sized Brodie in 35-kilo, to the men’s senior heavyweight bronze-medallist Stephen Naeth in the 84-kilo class.
Brodie, who turned 13 last week, kicks her legs and moves her arms with furious speed, yet so precisely. She began at age four and said she got hooked on karate “because training and learning things is so much fun, and I have really good coaches.”
Everything changed for karate when it was added as an Olympic sport, starting in Tokyo, along with surfing, wall-climbing, skateboarding, men’s baseball and women’s softball. All those newly -added sports are popular on the Island and it could mean a windfall of new faces from here headed to Tokyo, such as Mathea Olin of Tofino in surfing, Elan Jonas-McRae of Nanaimo/Central Saanich in wall-climbing and Emma Entzminger and Sarah Chow of Victoria in softball.
“Top young athletes in other sports could always point to the Olympics as their ultimate goal. We never had that before in karate — now, we do,” said Mosdell a fifth-degree black belt, who coached for 10 years at the oldest and most legendary karate high school in Tokyo.
“And with that comes a lot more government support.”
That could combine to elevate to the podium the likes of young Canadian karate performers such as Brodie.
“It’s a good, long-term goal for me,” she said.
