JACK MILNER

Pictured : Shane Dorfman – there’s just no stopping him. 

What has happened is a change in the way he looks at life, of what is important now and the way he looks at achieving his objectives.

In the world of karate the Dorfman family is legendary. Father Malcolm set the tone and was a trailblazer in the sport. Then came Shane, producing one record after another.

In 2004, at the age of 29, he became the youngest person ever to achieve a sixth grade. Now, at the age of 40, he is the youngest to achieve a Seventh Dan.

Shane first made an impact on world karate when in 1986 as an 11-year-old he entered All-Japanese Junior Championships. “There were 4 000 Japanese kids and this one blond Caucasian one. Nobody outside of Japan ever entered this event and to make matters worse, in 1986 South Africans were not welcome,” said Shane. He entered as an Israeli – and won.

In 1992, at age 17 and too young to enter the fighting part of the tournament, he won the JKA World Championships for kata.

A year later he was named SA All Styles Grand Champion and by the time he was 19 he was Under-19 All Styles Grand Champion.

In 2000 he made the decision to focus on traditional karate which takes the focus off the sporting side of karate and puts it onto the fighting side. “It’s not the philosophy of the sport to go around and kill anybody, but it’s about being able to deliver that killer blow. Of course, to do that you have to risk skin to get into a fight.”

Does this ever become a purely instinctive process?  “I don’t believe in instinct,” says Shane. “You work hard to develop pattern recognition and you then learn to interpret that. It’s all about correct decision making.”

For the next nine years he dominated in the sport and in 2009, for the first time in more than a decade, he did not participate in the world championships.

‘’I’m a hyper competitive person and when I don’t win it’s not that I fall apart or went mad, it just made me feel incomplete. When I did not participate in the 2009 championships I suddenly realised that for the first time this decade I was not going to be a world champion.

“I suddenly realised why people like Lance Armstrong have the need to come back because when you stop competing, the void you feel when you’ve been the best in the world is massive.

He studied medicine and worked in the field, then completed an MBA and left clinical medicine to work on the business side of medicine. “But I didn’t really feel fulfilled.”

That brought about the second major change – his decision to specialise in radiology.

“Most people don’t make it through the first time but I was fortunate to do so. Radiology is so vast and it changes all the time.”

His third change is that he has bought a house for the first time! And he does admit that in some ways he is mellowing.

“From a karate point of view I am not looking at qualifying for my Eighth Dan for a long time. I also want to focus on my kiddie class – four to six years old.”

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Danica called up to national training camp

Danica Schlome made a breakthrough in her promising table tennis career by receiving a call-up from the South African Table Tennis Board to attend training with the national Junior Squad.

The training camp ran from October 3 to 10 in preparation for the 2016 African and World Youth Championships.

Although the squad is not necessarily the final team, 16-year-old Danica is hopeful she will be selected. “Ever since I started playing table tennis, I have had two main aspirations, namely to achieve honours at school  (King David Linksfield) which I recently accomplished, and to play for South Africa.

“Participating in the training camp takes me one step closer to my dream,” explained Danica.

She competed at the 2013 Maccabi Games, winning bronze in both the junior team and doubles events and reaching the quarterfinals of the competition.

Her game has since improved and she is currently ranked sixth in South Africa and number one in Gauteng.

This year Danica made it through to the quarterfinals of the girls singles at the Interprovincial Championships, beating two national players in the process. She has also won two silver medals in the girls doubles at this event in the past.