News
From September 2-4, 2022, the demonstration team from Wayland Li Wushu performed in the Toronto Dragon Festival. The event was hosted by the Canadian Association of Chinese Performing Arts, and held at Nathan Phillips Square in downtown Toronto.
The team from Wayland Li performed an exciting Wushu demonstration, as well as several instances of the Lion Dance.
Congrats to all the performers and parents!
Congratulates to all 27 athletes from Wayland Li that competed in the 2022 Canadian Nationals at Thunder Bay, Ontario!
Your hard work and years of training paid off.
Key Achievements:
7 athletes (Caleb Akai, Lia Tang-Ruggiero, Amanda Sun, Allen Liu, Venus Li, Sophia Liao, Marcus Li) from Wayland Li selected to represent Canada at the 8th World Junior Wushu Championships in Indonesia. 3 athletes on the reserve team (Ashley Liu, Chris Gao and Eason Gao). Congratulations team!
2 athletes (Erica Li and Rex Lam) from Wayland Li’s Senior Division to represent Canada at the 2023 World Wushu Championships in the United States. 1 athlete on reserve team (Ashley Liu). Well done!
Group A: 1 gold medal, 3 silver and 5 bronze medals among Caleb, Kai-Hsin, Ashley and Ruth.
Group B: 8 gold medals, 3 silver and 3 bronze among Lia, Amanda, Chloe, Allen and Chris.
Group C: 6 gold medals, 6 silver and 2 bronze among Venus, Sophia, Clara, Marcus and Eason.
Seniors: 3 gold medals, 2 silver and 3 bronze among Erica, Rex, Ashley, and Kai-Hsin. Top 5 finishes for Tiggy and Caleb.
Open recreational events: 9 students participated in competition for the first time, taking home 1 gold, 18 silver and 6 bronze medals. Well done Ellie, Angelica, Oliver, Benjamin, Jerrica, Thomas, Michael, Alex and Brianna!
On July 29-31, 2022, twenty-seven athletes from Wayland Li Wushu participated in the 2022 Canadian National Wushu Championships and the event received both local and national news coverage.
Jia you!!! 加油！
https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/thunder-bay/martial-arts-championships-thunder-bay-1.6536588
CBC News · Posted: Jul 30, 2022 6:00 AM ET | Last Updated: July 30
Hundreds of martial artists from across Canada are in Thunder Bay, Ont., this weekend for a major showcase event.
The 2022 Canadian Martial Arts Championships and Festival began Friday evening with an opening gala. The event continues Saturday and Sunday at Lakehead University's C.J. Sanders Fieldhouse.
"It's a very special and unique event," said managing coordinator Alan Tang of WushuOntario. "It's the first time being held in northern Ontario and of course, in Thunder Bay."
Tang said the event has more than one purpose. Not only is it part of the selection process for Canada's national wushu — defined by WushuCanada as "an officially recognized sport by the International Olympic Committee representing the essence of the Chinese Martial Arts" — but it will also hopefully spread awareness about the sport in the northern Ontario region.
"Many people have seen it, they just haven't realized it or recognized it for what it is," he said of wushu. "They see it in movies and film all the time, through Jackie Chan, Jet Li, Donnie Yen, all Chinese kung fu action-based movies."
"This is the sport and the activity that people learn behind it."
Tang himself works in the film industry. He's amassed a number of credits, working as stunt coordinator, trainer, or performer in several well-known films, including: Marvel's Shang-Chi: The Legend of the Ten Rings, Jupiter's Legacy, Birth of the Dragon, In the Tall Grass, Skyscraper, and Netflix's upcoming live-action adaptation of Avatar: The Last Airbender.
"We're educating them on the different elements of the sport, the different styles," Tang said. "Much like when you're looking at gymnastics, you have parallel bars, you have floor routines, you have rings.
"In wushu, you have the straight sword, or the broadsword, the staff, the spear," he said. "These are terminologies that we really want to educate the public on.
"We want to educate them on the history and as well the athletes and how athletic the sport is," he said. "So many [people] know it as kung fu, as the traditional North American term. But wushu is the Olympic sport-recognized term for it."
Tang said the Thunder Bay event will help qualify athletes for the world and world junior championships, which are taking place in Indonesia in December.
And while the competitors appearing at this weekend's championships are very skilled, martial arts is beneficial to everyone, Tang added.
"What differentiates wushu from, say, other sports, is it is a recreational activity that can be practiced by both young and old," Tang said. "You can start at age three, and it's a lifelong sport that you can practice."
"And the reason why is that there are so many different elements of it," he said. "There are health elements, such as a very popular one, which is tai chi. Tai chi is a part of the wushu curriculum, and you'll see both senior athletes participating in competition, as well as young athletic teenagers participating in competition.
"So it provides such a wide variety and such a diversity of action that it keeps a lot of athletes engaged and involved."
Thunder Bay's Brian Nieminen, a volunteer with the weekend's event, has been studying tai chi for about 15 years.
"All martial arts ultimately are very, very similar in the sense that they train the body," he said. "And if you want to fight, you have to harden your body, strengthen your body, whether it's tai chi or any other martial art.
"But most people aren't doing it for fighting," he said. "Most people are doing it for their health."
Nieminen said he hopes the championships will provide some benefits to Thunder Bay.
"It's very good for the city because we're drawing in people from all across Canada," he said. "Many of them, probably most of them, are coming here for the first time.
"It gives us a chance to showcase … our city and our hospitality," Nieminen said. "From the martial arts standpoint, hopefully it'll generate more interest than ever."
Summer Camp Registration is Open. Sign up Today!
We’re happy to announce that we will be hosting Summer Camp for wushu students at all levels during the following weeks:
Week 1: Monday Aug 8 - Friday Aug 12
Week 2: Monday Aug 15- Friday Aug 19
Time: 2:30 PM - 5:30 PM
Location: 10 East Wilmot Street, Unit 21, Richmond Hill
There will be a 30 minute break in the afternoon. Please bring your own snacks and water.
If you’re interested, please email us (info@waylandliwushu.com) to reserve your spot in the summer camp.
See you there!
The Wayland Li Team
The Wayland Li Martial Arts intermediate students performed at the 20th Asian Heritage Culture Festival held at Bridlewood Mall on May 29th.
For these students, while it may have been the first or second demo they’ve performed, they did a wonderful job of adjusting to the stage, remembering their placement and giving a strong performance. The students also received a certificate of appreciation from the host of the festival, Canada One Family Network.
Thank you to all parents for supporting the demo and thank you to the students who performed! Great work everyone.
The 2022 Canadian National Wushu Championships will be held from July 28 to 31st in Thunder Bay, Ontario. We are super excited to be training and sending a superb team to the national team trial selections. All the best to all athletes and take this time to train hard!!!
The venue will be held at Lakehead University and will feature High Performance Wushu athletes, traditional Kungfu, Taiji and Sanda events.
Athletes that make the Canadian National team will have the opportunity to compete in the World Junior Wushu Championships this December, which will be held in Indonesia.
Good luck to everyone and train hard!!
加油！
Our demonstration team was kindly invited to join the 2022 My Mulan show and our athletes were prominently featured in the show. We joined both performances on March 18th and 20th, There were many rehearsals and planning out choreography. But all of it definitely worth it, especially for our newer athletes where this was their first demo.
Well done team! And of course thank you to everyone at Lin Dance Academy!
Wayland Li Wushu performed a demo for the Mississauga Night 2022《安捷之夜 - 2022密西沙加新春晚会》which was hosted by the Mississauga Chinese Arts Organization (MCAO) 密市华人艺术团 and co-produced by the Canada Performing Artists Network 加拿大演艺联盟(CPAN).
This was our first in-person demo since the pandemic and our students performed wonderfully! Thank you to all the students and parents for their hard work.
A quick peek behind the scenes of what our students do to prepare for a demo.
We’re happy to announce that we will be hosting March Break camp for wushu students at all levels during the following dates:
Dates: Tuesday March 15 to Friday March 18
Times: 9 AM to 12 PM
There will be a 30 minute break in the morning. Please bring your own snacks and water. There will be no lunch.
If you’re interested, please email us (info@waylandliwushu.com) to reserve your spot in the March Break camp.
See you there!
The Wayland Li Team
Thank you to all lion dancers from the Wayland Li Martial Arts Centre who came in to ring the Year of the Tiger on February 5, 2022 at Pacific Mall. It was great to see new and old faces a like! And thank you to all the businesses at Pacific Mall, and the mall operations team. Stay safe and Happy New Year!
新年快乐！恭喜发财！
Wayland Li Martial Centre 李文启武术学院
Master Wayland Li (李文启师傅)
145 Royal Crest Ct, Unit 28
Markham, ON L3R 9Z4
Email: info@waylandliwushu.com
