Cumbria Combat Sport competes in European Kickboxing Championship

Cumbria Combat Sports, based in Barrow, travelled down to Barnsley for the competition and brought home an array of medals. 

The gym is so new that it only started looking for sponsorships and kit designs at the beginning of the summer. Yet for people like Ellie Hillman, who took gold in her weight category for kickboxing, it has already changed her life. 

The Cumbria Combat Sport fighters with their medals

Ellie said she has only been doing kickboxing for three years.

She said: "It originally started off as fitness and then lockdown hit and I focused on it so much by practising. Eventually, when lockdown finished, Cumbria Combat took me right under their wing. Now we are just a family.

"They are massively important. Everything I can thank Cumbria Combat Sports for-their support and for pushing me over COVID." 

Barrow has been waiting for a new martial arts centre for a long time, but it is particularly unusual for women in the area to get into the sport, which Ellie wanted to address.

"It is not a big thing round here, I am one of the only women round that do it," she said.

"I would hate to think that there's women that think it is a men's sport. I would say one hundred per cent go for it." 

The gym is run by Ryan Thomas, who is a Mixed Martial Arts (MMA) fighter from Barrow. His current amateur MMA record is 4 wins, 1 loss, and 0 draws. 

Last April, he organised the Xtreme Kombat 15 event at Hoops Basketball Centre, which was an MMA event featuring top fighters from across the north-west.

READ MORE: Barrow hosts MMA Xtreme Kombat 15 event with The Lock In

Local fighter Ajay Harris claimed a dominant victory in his K1 bout against Josh Alderson of North Lakes Combat Academy. 

K1 is a form of fighting which combines at least karate, kickboxing and kung-fu. 

Chris Clake, who runs another popular MMA competition called it 'the best amateur MMA event I have ever seen.'