Seido Juku Kata

[Dani_001]

Hi peeps,

I just wanna know if anyone has a decent link to Seido Juku katas? Maybe JR 137?

I would like to roughly get an idea of them and how they work.

Thanks.

[JR 137]

Cape Town Seido is run by Jun Shihan Anver Wahab. I met him last year; he was one of the referees and judges in the division I competed in at our 40th anniversary even last summer. Seemed like a very nice person.

With Nakamura coming from Kyokushin, we do pretty much the same kata. We do a few Seido kata created by Nakamura, but they're along the lines of traditional kata, unlike Enshin and Ashihara.

There's no publicly available Seido kata videos I know of, but Google search Kyokushin kata videos. We do them with very subtle variation.

We don't spend a lot of time on bunkai. I'd like to see more of it, but I'm ok with that.

[Dani_001]

I have met Shihan Anver Wahab and he made me feel at home. I told him of my history of martial arts and said I need a place to settle down. If you read my journey, which is one of the topics, then you will see. I did an introductory class and I literally was in a puddle of my own sweat. I loved it. In fact, his dojo is two minutes drive from my residence.

[JR 137]

I read the post in the Enshin thread too, so I guess I'll kill two birds with one stone here...

Seido's founder, Tadashi Nakamura, was the chief instructor at Kyokushinkaikan honbu in Tokyo. He was sent here (US) by Mas Oyama to start Kyokushin. For quite some time he was considered the top Kyokushin teacher in the world.

I mention this because there's still a strong Kyokushin influence in Seido. We're no longer bare knuckle, but there's still that military-like mentality of respect, etiquette, formality etc. There's also the hard work and keep getting up mentality. A thing people on the outside don't often see about Kyokushin is the pace. It's not a kick and punch 100 miles per hour pace, but it's a constantly keeping up the pressure on your opponent pace. Seido, as least as I've trained it, has maintained that. Class starts, and it's one thing into the next, into the next, and on until class ends. There's typically no standing around contemplating things. I can't speak for every dojo, and it's different with kids, but that's how it is where I train and by all accounts Nakamura's dojos.

Every dojo is different because every CI is different. Different teachers emphasize different things, but they all teach the same curriculum (or at least are supposed to). Nakamura, his son, and quite often Charles Martin (from Fighting Black Kings) travel and visit overseas dojos. And overseas branch chiefs routinely visit honbu (in NYC). So with this comes a good level of quality control and consistency. For an organization that's on every continent except Antarctica, the uniformity of techniques is very good. Branch chiefs and CIs are held accountable for their students' performance.

Again, every dojo is different. There are some dojos that are predominantly children doing point fighting. There are others, like mine, that are predominantly adults training hard. And there's everything between.

If you like the CI and the dojo, stick around. I'm not saying that as a Seido guy; I'm saying that as an MA guy. Seido isn't perfect. I'd like to see a bit more joint locks and throwing, but I can happily live with what Seido is for a long time.