THE competition season has kicked off for Dubbo's Pollet's Martial Arts Centre, with 20 students and their coaches travelling to Bathurst recently to compete in the ISKA Western Nationals Karate tournament.

Students came from throughout the state and all different martial arts backgrounds to compete in divisions ranging from Little Tigers (six and under) to full contact fighting and jiu jitsu.

The students from Dubbo were not deterred by the high level of competition from schools that had travelled from Sydney.

Many of the competitors had been training for two months in preparation for the tournament.

Pollet's Martial Arts Centre was the top ranked school during the course of the day beating the nearest rival from Sydney by more than 2000 points.

Dubbo's two Little Tigers, Holly Bowden and Ericka Keizer, performed exceptionally.

Holly, who was competing for the first time, came away with third place in the Tigers division while Ericka had a great day with second place in showmanship and third in jiu jitsu (grappling).

The junior competitors took to the stage next bringing home a trove of trophies.

Nine-year-old Makaah Darcy placed first in traditional weapons, second in kata and third in point sparring.

Jason Bain was competing for the first time and placed first in jiu jitsu while fellow first-timer Raymond Bowden placed second in his jiu jitsu match.

Ella Matthews performed an exceptional weapons kata and placed first while Max Collins placed first in kata and narrowly missed out on third place in his first point sparring match.

Jiu Jitsu student Kalib Townsend placed second in his age division, 14-year-old Connah Matthews placed third in the full contact sparring after dominating his opponent, Daniel Horder also placed first in the full contact and Melissa Wass performed a flawless kata to place first ahead of higher graded competitors.

Dubbo's senior students put on a great performance across the board with Nick Owens fighting through three rounds of full-contact to place first in the men's division.

Local fighter Lachlan Frankland went on to win both the No Gi grappling and the senior mens jiu jitsu, while first-time competitor Brad Croxon took on more experienced wrestlers to take out third place.

Brett Keizer placed second in showmanship with his daughter Ericka, and Tammy Hulak put on a strong performance to place third in traditional weapons. Michelle Kosef placed third in traditional kata and Sarah Brown fought exceptionally well in point sparring and jiu jitsu to place third in both divisions.

Honourable mentions go to Nicole Matthews, Trudy Everingham and Bella Matthews, who also competed but narrowly missed on top three placings.

"This is an awesome start to the year with 20 students bringing 22 trophies home to Dubbo against tough competition from the city," head instructor Matt March said.

"This year is also a World Cup year for the International Sports Karate Association, so watch this space and expect to see us bringing some more World Titles back home to Dubbo once again."