The Karate1 Youth League rolled into Poreč on Croatia’s Istrian coast from 2 to 5 July for the third stop of the 2026 season, after Harare in March and Manila in May. Across 34 divisions, from U14 through cadet to junior, the next generation fought for ranking points and podiums, and one nation stood above everyone.
🇺🇦 Ukraine’s golden weekend
Ukraine topped the medal table with seven golds and 24 medals in total, twice as many medals as anyone else. Hanna Maistrenko (Cadet Kumite -47 kg), Arina Stepanova (Cadet -54 kg), Dmytro Mitin (Cadet -70 kg) and Yevhen Tahiiev (Cadet 70+ kg) gave the blue and yellow four cadet titles on their own. Sharliz Kruhlova added U14 gold in the 52+ kg division, and in the juniors Savelii Ilchuk (-76 kg) and Yaroslav Kinash (76+ kg) closed out the weekend with two more titles in the heaviest categories.
Kumite at full stretch in Poreč. Photo: WKF.
🇭🇷 The hosts strike twice
Croatia sent the home crowd back up the Istrian coast with eight medals, and two of them were gold, both in U14. Lucija Scuric went one better than her silver in Fujairah earlier this season to win the U14 Kumite -42 kg title, and Nina Končar made it a double for the hosts in the -47 kg division minutes later.
🥋 Kata: Spain sweep, Vercimak repeats
The kata mats belonged to Spain. In Cadet Kata Female, Uxia Folgueira Gonzalez, Candela Peña Garcia and Ariadna Benedicto Acosta locked out gold, silver and a bronze in a near clean sweep of the podium, and in U14 Valeria Rebollo Carvajal and Luna Capetillo Lopez went one-two. Twelve Spanish medals made them the weekend’s second force behind Ukraine.
The sweep also ended a perfect season. Germany’s Mariel Goethe, who had won Cadet Kata Female at both Fujairah and Manila, had to settle for bronze this time.
In Cadet Kata Male the Fujairah final replayed itself beat for beat: Slovakia’s Martin Vercimak took gold ahead of Hong Kong, China’s Marcus Wong Kin Ho, the exact one-two from earlier this season. And in Junior Kata Male there was a familiar name on the podium: England’s Theo Langhorn, senior kata champion at the Polish Open two weeks ago, took bronze in his own age group.
Medal ceremony lineup on the Poreč tatami. Photo: WKF.
🇵🇱 Balut medals again
A selfie with the bronze: Natalia Balut celebrates her first Karate1 medal in Poreč.
Two weeks after her double gold at the Polish Open, Natalia Balut was back on a podium: bronze in Junior Kumite Female 66+ kg, this time on the WKF’s official youth circuit. Italy’s Nicole Correddu took the title, and the Czech Republic’s Dominika Sucha, a bronze medallist behind Balut in Bielsko-Biała too, matched her with the other bronze. For Balut it is a first Karate1 medal, and ranking points to go with the trophies.
🌍 Around the mats
Portugal’s Isis Matos, the Harare junior -53 kg champion, collected another Youth League medal with bronze in the -48 kg division, while Denmark’s Hannah Bath Soendergaard took Junior -59 kg silver, her second of the season after Fujairah. Latvia’s Kirills Sorohovs, a U21 silver medallist at the Polish Open, added junior bronze in the -68 kg class.
Italy finished second on golds with four titles across the age groups, and in total 38 nations left Croatia with at least one medal.
Every podium from all 34 divisions is in our results database: the full Poreč 2026 medal tables.
Sources
- Official results, Karate1 Youth League Poreč 2026 (2 to 5 July 2026): WKF / sportdata
Reporting on the Karate1 Youth League Poreč 2026. All names, categories and finishing positions are drawn from the official results. Action and ceremony photos: WKF.