After six months of hard work and virtual masterpieces, James De Los Santos is now on top of the world.
The 30-year-old veteran karateka officially reached the number one ranking in the SportData e-Kata rankings when the points were counted as of Thursday afternoon.
De Los Santos has now garnered 8950 points over rival Eduardo Garcia of Portugal, who is at 8575, after taking his 14th and 15th golds earlier in the week at the 1st Euro Grand Prix and e-Karate Games second edition, respectively.
It was the Filipino’s sixth consecutive title since the previous month, when he bagged the Mitad Del Mundo Hatamotokai E-Tournament Ranked Event gold. It was a bounce-back from his 10th place performance in the previous tournament.
“I proudly raise this [Philippine] flag in triumph,” said De Los Santos.
“When I hit the number two spot back on August 6, I was behind by nearly 3000 points to number one. I thought to myself, ‘Wow that’s a big gap. How am I ever going to reach that?’ I was discouraged at first, but my kata coach Masa Saito reminded me to take it one tournament at a time,” he continued.
“I’m really glad. We proved nothing is impossible. The path so far isn’t always easy. But we never give up and we climbed up to the top,” coach Saito commented. “I am so happy that I’m sharing this moment with this amazing karateka James. I’m grateful for the support we had from our family and friends. I’m so lucky to coach such a talented player.”
Nonetheless, the former ISKF World Champion knows that the job is far from over. The hunter has become the hunted.
“My new goal is to maintain the number one spot throughout the year,” De Los Santos continued. “This is a much bigger challenge, as there will be other e-Kata players who want the number one spot as well.
“But this will keep me grinding and motivated. Big thank you to those who supported me.”
