GKR Karate

[jones]

Have any of you guys had these fellows knocking on your door asking you to join GKR karate? They seem to be door to door karate salesmen. I had a look and the standard looks pretty poor - no contact sparring, kids and adults in the same class, long term payment plans, people getting black belts in a couple of years etc etc etc.

Do you know anything about the GKR Karate organisation? It's supposed to be a huge business apparently.

[random]

I can’t say I have heard of them but I did find this www.gkrkarate.com/do you think it is the same people?

[AngelaG]

Hmmmm GKR karate. Probably one of the most renowned karate groups on web forums. I have seen a LOT of discussion about this group; their practices seem to bring out a lot of emotion in karateka.
Here's a link to a forum:
www.gkrkarate.net/forum/forum.asp?FORUM_ID=63

[random]

Beat me to that one Angela, I have just been looking at it

[jones]

The link doesn't seem to be working for me random. Apparantly the bloke I spoke to who was a regional manager/blackbelt (his words) told me that they were very secretive about the details of their organisation. They don't let people just walk into a class and join and there isn't much info on their website. He says that in order to join you have to be visited by a consultant (door to door karate salesman)first who will sign you up.

You can actually get a full time job doing this. It was advertised in the paper as as "Self defence consultants wanted". When I enquired I was told that I was to work from 12 PM til 9 PM "canvassing" areas. Which means knocking on peoples doors asking them if they want to do karate. In the hours of 12 til 2 I apparently do my Karate training which will train me up towards a blackbelt/manager. It takes two years of door knocking and training to reach this point apparantly. However, once I attain the Blackbelt/manager title my door knocking days would be over and I would become a regional manager and instructor after two years. Then I would be able to work from home and have my own area of GKR schools that I would manage and a gang of "Consultants" that I would send out to try and get people to join the GKR empire.

Seriously though man, I kid you not. This is what the guy told me when I enquired about the job. He was a regional manager and had done his time door knocking. He offered me the job but I didn't taken it because knocking on peoples doors seems a crap job to me and the GKR organisation looked a bit dodgy to be honest. That said it's supposed to be the biggest Karate organisation in the world.

Maybe this is the future of martial arts.

[random]

Jones try the forum site, very enlightening. I hope they don't come knocking around here. Also try this link ther was some extra bits on the one before.

www.gkrkarate.com

[jones]

I just been reading a thread on the forum. It sounds more and more horrendous the more I read.

In my oppinion this organbisation is endangering their "consultants" by sending them around rough areas claiming to teach self defence when they have no decent training whatsoever and are extremely inexperienced.

I'm going to read some more accounts from people on that forum about the GKR. Nice one for providing the link Angela. Lets expose this sinister cult for what it is.

[jones]

I have to say that this GKR organisation needs to be brought to its knees. What a complete joke of a martial art. This would be totally hilarious if it wasn't actually destroying Karate's reputation as a martial art.

I will try and infiltrate this organisation and destroy it from within. Maybe if I can plant drugs or a firearm on one of the senior instructors and then phone the filth. This would be certain to damage their reputation as "The family organisation" - BWAHAHAHHAHAA - that would be funny wouldn't it?

[Aefibird]

I've never trained in GKR, but I have trained with someone who used to train in GKR. He had nothing complimentary to say about the organisation, especially about the way in which it was run.
Most of the opinions I've heard about GKR and the way that the organisation is run/managed have negative, very few positive.

[Sionnagh]

They have a good business model and great marketing strategy. I am referring only to GKR the business. Their karate is "lowest common denominator" stuff and they use students to teach classes by offering incentives like free training and equipment discounts and of course a little flattery goes a long way.

The trouble is that the grass roots members are generally sincere individuals who enjoy what they do. But they believe they're learning karate, and the organisation's management does it's best to discourage students training outside their own classes, even to the point of telling them they're not allowed to.

And when the organisation is criticised they will rally round and defend it because, just like anyone else, they don't like to be told they're wasting their time or money.

It does seem the best approach is to basically ignore what they do (in a sense) and carry on talking about karate, training, techniques etc. When people think they're missing out on something they quickly become curious and want to know more.


Mick

[jones]

Yes, good point. I was told that if I took the job as consultant then I wouldn't be able to cross train in any other style. Lol he even gave the example of "It would be like the managing director of Ford driving a Vauxhall".

What a complete and utter **** organisation. I now wish I'd just told him to shove his door knocking job up his **** and then challenged him to a fight outside. However, I just politely pretended to be impressed and then never phoned back.


Edit: By Angela

[AngelaG]

GKR aren't the only martial arts group out there with what I might consider dubious teaching practices. Neither is it specifically a karate issue. However I don't train at GKR, so to be honest, I don't really care. People must be getting something out of it, or they wouldn't be putting down their hard earned cash every week. Maybe they're never going to be the greatest fighters, or win any International Championships, but as long as they enjoy what they do surely it's not our perogative to be going around and issuing them challenges or trying to topple them.

The best way to deal with something like this is to make sure that what you teach is good stuff, and eventually quality will out. However there will always be people that want quick access to grades, a light workout and no hassle to train more than once or twice a week. As far as I am aware people in this country still have the freedom to be making choices like that!?!

The only time people should think about making a stand against something like this is when there are dangerous practices etc. going on, However as far as I am aware this is not an issue.

Heck, I wouldn't want to be taught be someone with 6 months experience, but that is down to me.

[jones]

Yeah but some people may be tricked into thinking this is actually quality Karate instruction. If you went to a resturant and was given cold food you wouldn't accept it. If you bought a TV and it didn't work properly, again, you wouldn't accept being sold it. Why then, do we accept it when people like the GKR sell people poor quality training?

Also, it can be argued that what they do is dangerous. they are filling people with a false sense of security by telling them they can defend themselves due to their GKR training. If these "senseis" got into a real fight they would get such a severe kicking that when they came round their clothes would be out of fashion. Also, getting inexperienced young people to go around rough areas knocking on doors asking people to join their Karate organisation is just asking for trouble.

[AngelaG]

I am never quite sure why GKR get picked on so much when there are SO many other places that run along the same lines.

Anyone here ever heard of the Matt Fiddes groups? They have a big presence in Devon, but they are spreading. www.mattfiddes.com

[kyokushinphil]

I trained in GKR once when I was living in the Midlands..............absolute rubbish!!

I have also heard of the Matt Fiddes group nothing particularly good mind you it seems to fall into this same marketing strong karate poor category........shame really