Post by Aefibird on Sept 26, 2004 11:44:22 GMT
This section was looking a little lonely, so I thought I'd write a little about my karate dojo. I know that this section of the forum is for people looking for a dojo... so if it's not apropriate then feel free to delete it!
Anyway, my karate dojo is called Swinton Karate Club, 'cos we're based in Swinton, South Yorkshire.
The instructor is Mr Graham Smith, 5th dan, who has been training in karate and other martial arts for over 30 years (about 33 years if I remember correctly!). He has trained with Asano Sensei and Kanazawa Sensei, along with other notable 'names' from Japan.
As well as holding Yondan in Shotokan, my sensei is also is experienced in several other styles of karate, including Okinawan Goju-Ryu and Kobayashi Shorin Ryu. He has also had experience in Judo, Ju-Jitsu and Aikido, as well as kobudo, boxing and street/RBSD.
I'd say that my Sensei's main style, however, is 'street' or 'what works best'. He's into realistic self-defence applications and uses these a lot when teaching his students.
Although the official club style is 'Shotokan', Sensei takes aspects from other styles and blends them together to give us a well-rounded MA eduaction. We train a lot in grappling and ground fighting - probably more so than a lot of Shotokan clubs, and also incorporate modern weapons training in the "Fight Club" nights, such as knife defence and the use of unusual objects as weapons.
We learn the 26 'usual' Shotokan kata (27 if you include Kihon kata/Taikyoku Shodan), and Sensei also teaches variations of Shotokan kata to brown and black belts. e.g. we learn the 'regular' Shotokan version of Kanku Dai and then we might also look at an Okinawan version of Kushanku and study the differences and similarities. We also learn kata from other styles.
My karate club is fairly small, but that's basically for reasons of the size of dojo we have. We rent a room above a pub (heaven!) and have at least 2 classes every night of the week in order to accommodate the number of people who wish to train. Because of the number of students that Sensei has (and the fact that he has to do split classes) it would make sense to find a larger room, but until Sensei Graham can find another room above a pub, I think the club will stay where it is!
Drinking is the 4th element of our club, along with Kihon, Kata and Kumite...
Hey, doesn't "dojo" actually mean "bar" in Japanese?? ;D ;D
I'd be interested to read about the clubs that people on here attend - how about getting a thread going?
EDIT: Just re-read this post and seen some glaring typos.
Anyway, my karate dojo is called Swinton Karate Club, 'cos we're based in Swinton, South Yorkshire.
The instructor is Mr Graham Smith, 5th dan, who has been training in karate and other martial arts for over 30 years (about 33 years if I remember correctly!). He has trained with Asano Sensei and Kanazawa Sensei, along with other notable 'names' from Japan.
As well as holding Yondan in Shotokan, my sensei is also is experienced in several other styles of karate, including Okinawan Goju-Ryu and Kobayashi Shorin Ryu. He has also had experience in Judo, Ju-Jitsu and Aikido, as well as kobudo, boxing and street/RBSD.
I'd say that my Sensei's main style, however, is 'street' or 'what works best'. He's into realistic self-defence applications and uses these a lot when teaching his students.
Although the official club style is 'Shotokan', Sensei takes aspects from other styles and blends them together to give us a well-rounded MA eduaction. We train a lot in grappling and ground fighting - probably more so than a lot of Shotokan clubs, and also incorporate modern weapons training in the "Fight Club" nights, such as knife defence and the use of unusual objects as weapons.
We learn the 26 'usual' Shotokan kata (27 if you include Kihon kata/Taikyoku Shodan), and Sensei also teaches variations of Shotokan kata to brown and black belts. e.g. we learn the 'regular' Shotokan version of Kanku Dai and then we might also look at an Okinawan version of Kushanku and study the differences and similarities. We also learn kata from other styles.
My karate club is fairly small, but that's basically for reasons of the size of dojo we have. We rent a room above a pub (heaven!) and have at least 2 classes every night of the week in order to accommodate the number of people who wish to train. Because of the number of students that Sensei has (and the fact that he has to do split classes) it would make sense to find a larger room, but until Sensei Graham can find another room above a pub, I think the club will stay where it is!
Drinking is the 4th element of our club, along with Kihon, Kata and Kumite...
Hey, doesn't "dojo" actually mean "bar" in Japanese?? ;D ;DI'd be interested to read about the clubs that people on here attend - how about getting a thread going?
EDIT: Just re-read this post and seen some glaring typos.
