16-year-old Taekwondo prodigy Frances Lloyd (Ngāpuhi) has just returned from the ITF Taekwondo World Cup in Budapest where she took gold, silver and best-overall medals.
Lloyd’s father Morgan and his wife Allyson are ‘very proud of her achievements’ while Lloyd herself is said to be ‘pretty stoked’ with her multiple medals.
Lloyd returned yesterday from the International Taekwondo Federation (ITF) World Cup in Budapest where she took the Best Overall Junior Female award as well as gold in the Junior Individual Female Special Techniques category and silver in the Female Sparring 65kgs+ category.
Lloyd, who attends Tauranga Girls’ College in Tauranga, has been training for 9-10 years according to her father. Her weekly training generally consists of 4-6 hours of Taekwondo and 8-10 hours of gym fitness training.
While there have been suggestions that Lloyd move into an Olympic martial arts discipline to enable her to compete for a medal at the Olympic games, for now she is focused on Taekwondo.
Her next challenge is the ITF World Championships to be held in Ireland next year.