Member News

November 15, 2006

City of North Miami Approves National Training Site

North Miami USA Judo National Training Site Team with Mayor Kevin Burns, North Miami City Council, Miami-Dade Sports Commission Executive Director Mike Sophia and USA Judo CEO Jose H. Rodriguez.

North Miami athletes Jeanette Rodriguez, Franchesca Durand and Bobby Lee are introduced at the North Miami City Council Meeting.

The North Miami City Council voted in a meeting last night to approve the development of a new training site in North Miami that will be used by USA Judo, U.S. Fencing, USA Taekwondo and USA Wrestling. 

Following the approval of this contract with the four NGBs, the City of North Miami will begin implementing a plan for the design and construction of the new training site.

“It has taken a little over a year to finalize this agreement with the City of North Miami, but we are pleased that it is now done and we are very grateful to Mayor Kevin Burns and the City Council for approving the new site,” said USA Judo CEO Jose H. Rodriguez (Colorado Springs, Colo.) “Once completed, we hope this will be one of many similar USA Judo National Training Sites, including our existing programs in Harlingen, Texas and Colorado Springs.  Our next step is to finalize the housing and educational deal with Johnson & Wales University in North Miami.”

Already, there is a strong contingent of young athletes competing as part of the North Miami USA Judo National Training Site program and the approval of City Council will enable these athletes to have a permanent elite-level facility.

The North Miami USA Judo National Training Site is led by Head Coaches German Velazco, a 2000 Olympian from Peru, and Jhonny Prado. 

Prado and Velazco, who coached the 2006 Junior World Team in October, were both in attendance during the meeting along with Rodriguez and North Miami athletes Bobby Lee (Coral Springs, Fla. / 73kg), Jeanette Rodriguez (Coral Springs, Fla. / 48kg), Ronnie Talledo (Coral Springs, Fla. / 60kg), Angelica Delgado (Miami, Fla. / 57kg), Franchesca Durand (Coral Springs, Fla. / 52kg) and Jean-Pierre Durand (Coral Springs, Fla. / 60kg).

“This is definitely great news,” said Prado. “We’re looking forward to the building opening and we’re just going to keep working hard and hopefully we’ll continue to see more great results in the next year.”

Athletes from the North Miami squad have had a great deal of success during the past year.  Most recently, seven athletes from the team won medals at the Senior U.S. Open Championships with Lee and Rodriguez taking their first gold medals.  Talledo, Adler Volmar (Miami, Fla. / Open) and Veronica Prado (Coral Springs, Fla. / 44kg) each won silver medals while Franchesca Durand and Jean-Pierre Durand took home bronze.