Refereeing Chair Shares 2025 Highlights

Carol Leverton, chair of the National Refereeing Commission (NRC), shares her thoughts on 2025 in an open letter, highlighting many of the successes from the year from at home and abroad.

Dear referees,

Having finished a successful and exciting British Championships run on the weekend of December 13th–14th across seven mats at the David Ross Sports Village, which draws a line under refereeing in 2025, I’d like to share a few thoughts on the year past.

Our Commission

In taking over as Chair, I’m delighted to be leading at a time where we have a strong set of British referees—some 300 of you supporting our events each and every weekend—alongside a motivated team of area reps and a talented group of young referees.

This year, we mark the retirement of Martin Rivers from the commission. We would like to express our sincere gratitude to Martin for his dedicated service and contributions to the NRC over the years.

I continue to work with our excellent team: Lisa Rivers, Keith Merrick, Archi Shrimpton, Stefan Newbury, and Dan Harris. As a reminder, Lisa remains responsible for refereeing queries and complaints, while Dan Harris serves as NRC Secretary.

Celebrating a Remarkable Legacy: Neil Lawcock

This year we celebrate the retirement from refereeing of Neil Lawcock. Neil leaves behind a remarkable legacy, defined by his unwavering commitment to developing and mentoring future generations of referees.

Neil’s impact on the refereeing community across Great Britain and specifically within the Welsh Judo Association has been profound. Having served as an Area Refereeing Representative and an IJF-level official, Neil has been responsible for training, supporting, and mentoring many referees who have gone on to represent British Judo at the highest levels. We thank him for his decades of service and the lasting mark he leaves on the mat.

International Highlights

This year saw three new IJF Continental Referees successful in their examinations abroad. Dan Harris achieved his qualification in Tashkent, Uzbekistan, in May, noting it as a landmark moment after over a decade of dedication. In October, Paul Grady and Stephen Sims were also successful in Malaga, Spain. We are delighted they were successful under the watchful gaze of the JUA, EJU, and IJF and welcome them to our “blue badge” ranks.

Lisa Rivers has completed another exceptional year on the IJF World Tour, representing Great Britain at:

• IJF Grand Slam Paris, France (Feb 1–2)
• IJF Grand Slam Baku, Azerbaijan (Feb 15–16)
• IBSA Grand Prix Giza, Egypt (Aug 18–19)
• IBSA European Championships, Tbilisi, Georgia (Sep 19–21)
• European Judo Championships Seniors Individual + Mixed Teams, Podgorica, Montenegro (Apr 23–27)

Our national and IJF referees also secured prestigious Championship selections throughout the season:

• Archi Shrimpton: European Judo Championships Cadets Ind + MT, Skopje, Macedonia (Jun 26–29)
• Graeme MacLachlan: EYOF, Skopje, Macedonia (Jul 21–25) and European Judo Championships U23 Ind + MT, Chisinau, Moldova (Oct 31–Nov 2)
• Stefan Newbury: European Judo Championships Juniors Ind + MT, Bratislava, Slovakia (Sep 4–7)

British Highlights

On home soil, we once again hosted the GBR Junior European Cup, providing a vital opportunity for our athletes and our referees to work at a challenging international-level event without leaving the UK.

Our domestic development remains robust. This year, we successfully ran our national seminar with high attendance from referees and coaches alike. We also held a specialised IJF Rules Seminar hosted by Neil Adams MBE and Lisa Rivers to prepare for the implementation of the 2025 Contest Rules, which see the return of the yuko score and changes to technical restrictions. We also continued our busy schedule of qualification courses, including Club, Area, and National C levels, as well as National B and National A examinations.

Congratulations to the referees who passed an exam for their referee level this year.

Awards

Turning to a final positive note before closing, I’d like to congratulate our award winners for their professionalism and dedication to the sport.

A special congratulations to Kirsty Lyon on being awarded the BJA’s Referee of the Year for 2025. Kirsty is recognized for her calm authority on the mats and her exceptional mentoring of new referees. We also celebrate David Gheorghiu, who was named Volunteer of the Year, balancing his international competition schedule with refereeing at local events.

Thank you all for everything you’ve done in 2025. On behalf of the whole NRC, I hope you all had a great Christmas and New Year!

Best wishes,

Carol Leverton NRC Chair

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