The new Premier League season will start in Paris this week, with the new record of 985 athletes registered from 75 countries, among which the top karatekas of the world.

Paris (France) will be the host of the first Karate 1 Premier League of the season for the twentieth time. The event will be held in the Pierre de Courbertin stadium on 22sd, 23rd and 24th of January.

The new Premier League season will start in Paris this week, with the new record of 985 athletes registered from 75 countries, among which the top karatekas of the world.

Paris (France) will be the host of the first Karate 1 Premier League of the season for the twentieth time. The event will be held in the Pierre de Courbertin stadium on 22sd, 23rd and 24th of January.

The Paris Open was one of the first events to join the Premier League, and has since this time become very popular as a starting point of the season. This year, the tournament starts an intensive year with 10x karate1, the 23rd World Senior Championships (Linz, Austria - 25-30 October 2016) and various world events (World Cup). But above all, for all karatekas in the world, 2016 will be marked by the decision of inclusion of karate in the Olympic Games in Tokyo in 2020, alongside Rio 2016.

At this major event, taking place less than 4 months before the European Senior Championships (this year in France, Montpellier), all the male and female Karatekas of the French national team will be on the Tatamis, as well as Turkey, Azerbaijan and Japan, Germany, Italy, Ecuador, Algeria, Denmark, Togo, Tunisia, Belgium, Iran, Morocco, Netherlands, Switzerland, Poland, Portugal, Saudi Arabia, Emirates United, Spain, Slovakia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Sweden, Ukraine, Vietnam … and other national teams from all over the world.

Many of world top athletes, such as Aghayev Rafael (Azerbaijan), Kiyou Shimizu (Japan), Douglas Brose (Brazil), Enes Erkan (Turkey), Luigi Busa (Italy), Serap Ozcelik (Turkey), Achraf Ouchen (Morocco), Alizee Agier (France), Sara Cardin (Italy) also a number of world medalists will also be present.

All those competitors are ready to propose a competition of an outstanding level. The most contested categories will be Kata individual male with 134 athletes from 42 nations and kumite male -67kg with 127 fighters from 42 nations.

PROGRAMME:

Friday, January 22nd 2016 : Kata Eliminations & Repechages
Starting at 3:00 pm: Individual Kata Male & Female

Starting at 7:00 pm: Team kata Male & Female

Saturday, January 23rd 2016: Kumite Eliminations & Repechages

Starting at 8:30 am: Kumite Male & Female -50Kg, -55Kg, -68 Kg, -60 Kg, -75 Kg, -84 Kg, +84Kg

Sunday, January 24th 2016 :Kumite Eliminations & Repechages + Finals for all categories

Starting at 8:30 am: Kumite Male & Female -67Kg, -61Kg, +68 Kg

FINALS FOR ALL CATEGORIES Sunday 3:00 pm / 5 :30 pm

The list of participants and real time results can be followed on the WKF website: www.wkf.net/karate1-paris-2016.php

Live stream: The Finals will be broadcasted live on L’Equipe 21, the most important sports TV channel in France

More information can be found on the official accounts of the event:

Web: evenementsffkarate.fr

Facebook: www.facebook.com/OpenParisKarate

Twitter: www.twitter.com/ffkarate (please use the official hastag #OpenParis2016) Press registration: presse.ffkarate.fr/accreditation-press/