ashworth

Ask your instructor more about the bunkai, we partner up and practise certain applications from kata on each other so that we understand where the kata is coming from. I have had students in the past show a strong dislike for kata, until I demonstrate the possibilities with different bunkai examples.

Hello, have always been interested in the Seishin Gi, but never taken the plunge and bought one, does anyone here have a Seishin Gi? thoughts on how it compares to other Gi that you have?

Enjoy it! I'm jealous that I don't have something like that with my club, take full advantage

Massive congrats! many people stop after shodan, well done for being one of the ones that kept going! Out of interest as it was just kata how long did the grading take? did you have to do any application work? or just do the kata?

Curiosity question - how do you collect payment? By that I mean everyone hands you, say, a $10 bill every time they walk in, or can they pay in advance? My former Sensei taught a cardio kickboxing class that was strictly pay as you go. He issued cards that were bought for a certain amount. Every class, he hole punched everyone's card. Once there were no classes left on the card, they bought a new card. A dojo I was looking into before I joined my current one did the same thing as a pay as you go option (you could also pay a monthly membership instead). At the moment they just pay cash when they turn up, although I am thinking about offering the chance to pay in advanced similar to the method your explained.

Pretty simple for me, my students turn up, pay for that class, and train in it. That is the way I prefer it, everyone else seems happy with it as well.

Keinosuke Enoeda would pretty much be at the top of my list, my instructor used to speak about him a lot.

Like what has been said, I believe that both have their place, and I teach both realistic and sport karate. We need the realistic teachings so that we don't go out into the world in fairy land, arguing with an attacker because he hit you after you clearly scored a point first, there is no referee on the street, its your responsibility to stop the fight... and at the same time I believe that the athleticism gained from sport karate can be good to help keep you in shape and be help increase your speed and reactions, both which could help in realistic situations. In my classes I do make a point of saying whether its for self defence or for sport so that the students are aware of what they are aiming for.

Like what has already been said, too much could go wrong, its really not worth it, the only type of instructors that I could imagine doing this, are instructors that are full of themselves, power hungry and feel like they have something to prove. I couldn't imagine doing it, I would feel so bad!

haven't been asked that before, anyone that knows me knows I'm the dude that does karate, and knows what a big deal it is to me. I have been doing it since I was 5... If I speak to someone that I haven't for a while, they ask if i'm still doing it, which after writing that out I realise can be quite a normal question, but I almost feel insulted that they need to ask. I will be doing it for my whole life, there is no doubt in my mind about that. part of me wishes that I will live to be past 100 so that I can be doing karate for longer...

Good luck for the testing and the tournament! What events are you doing in the tournament?

Congrats! Sandan is a great achievement and milestone keep it up!

Sounds like a good way to get your class shut down... if they had an incident running the class there would be major consequences...

Black belt student... Okay, so I'm having a student approaching his Shodan, he will actually be going for it in a months time, this is the first student I have had attempt their black belt (have been teaching around 6 years now) and I am really excited about the event. It's just amazing seeing them train hard and achieve a big goal like that, I'm more excited about him getting his black belt than I was when I got mine! So it got me thinking, I want to somehow celebrate the achievement, both for the student and for the club. Do you remember your first student that made it to black belt? what did you do if anything to celebrate the occasion?

We tend to only shut for Christmas holidays and resume first week in Jan, have closed before due to holiday's and that but now I have a student that's about to become an instructor and will be able to run the classes whenever I am away.

Exactly what the others have said so far, in my classes when we do sparring, to start off the first couple of rounds very slow and light, I make a point of saying for these rounds the objective isn't to score points, its to throw out different combinations for your partner to block, so they have to work at a speed where they can both block the techniques coming in, naturally as the round goes on pace will increase.

One person that inspired me through a big part of my training was an instructor called steve, he was a guy in his 50s that was always looking to push our classes to the limits and get involved in the class as much as he could and do it all with us. I wanted to keep going and get better because of the hard work that he put in to give us hard classes like that.

I simply love what I do and want to share my experiences. I have trained in a few different clubs, but no single club could offer everything that I got from the other clubs so I decided to form my own and try to incorporate everything that I liked from all the other clubs and removed anything I didn't...

Can't remember much as I started when I was 5, a few years has gone by since then!

You can have high kicking techniques in shotokan as well...

I use bunkai to help teach students the movements of the kata, could be teaching them a kata and there may be a particular movement they aren't quite getting right so I'll explain what the movement could be for and get them to try it out themselves. another thing with the way I teach bunkai, I have ideas on the most practical bunkai for the kata I teach. But not a believer in saying this is what this move is for and thats that, I don't believe that there is a right answer. I believe you can make the bunkai the way you want to suit your karate and your own limits. one movement doesn't have to have just one meaning, for example, our basic kata, Taikyo kyu shodan opening movement is a gedan barai to the left in long forward stance, some people keep the bunkai basic as its a low grade kata and say your blocking a kick then stepping through and punching. I have also seen an example of the same move being used to escape a wrist grab, and even an example of escaping a bear hug. so to get back on point, I teach bunkai depending on how mature and advanced the student is right from day one, they have to know why they are doing the movements otherwise they are just moving around for the sake of it.

Been a Sandan for about 4 years now, quite happy where I am at the moment so no plans on looking for my next grading, at the moment I'm actually looking more to other styles to expand my base knowledge a bit more, so have put the white belt back on and trying out another style of karate.

Seen this before, sometimes parents view it as cheap childcare,

thanks for your input guys. Went around some of the local dealerships today, wasn't overly impressed by ford, vauxhaul were a bit of a left down, best offer they could offer was an ex demo at around £158 a month, and that only with a years warranty, but then I went to Kia after and could get a brand new Rio for less than that which also includes services for the first 3 years and 7 years warranty. Going into the Seat dealership tomorrow to see what they can offer, I did pop in today for a quick look and he thinks they can beat the offer I got with Kia. Will have to wait and see!

Welcome back, feel free to stay this time