You've all gone quiet on us!!
Please let us know your idea's and suggestions for the club either on the message board or email me privately.
By Sensei Sarah
Update 30/10/2008
It's that time of year again when we must think towards the presentation evening and club christmas party!! How quickly it comes round! We have been lucky enough to secure Golborne Sports & Social Club (known to some as 'Intex') for friday 19th December. This will be the first time we have held the awards evening at this venue which we are assured is a great place for a party. As usual there will be a disco and buffet, along with the annual awards presentation. Each student will receive an award and special awards will be presented to those students who we feel deserve particular mention, such as 'most improved' and 'student of the year'.
As always, every club member is asked to take part in a sponsored event, which, following the success of last year will be a kick & punch -a thon. Please make sure you get a sponsor form from Sensei and start gathering your sponsors now! An award is up for grabs for the person who manages to raise the most money. Tickets to teh evening will be available on returning your sponsor money.
The final club kyu gradings of 2008 are also due to take place shortly (see the calender for the date) so please make sure you have a valid license and enough training sessions in, there is now no excuse for not having attended enough training sessions with a choice of 4 nights to choose from. We will be assessing students over he next couple of weeks for eligibility and all eligible students will be notified by sensei once this has been done so make sure you attend training regularly and as always, train hard!!! A word of warninig - Grades must be earned, they will not be given for simply turning up!
Update 25/09/2008
Changes Ahead
The club will see a few changes implemented in the coming month which are all aimed at the improvement of the club and maintaining the high standards of training and achievement seen in the years gone by.
First of all the Academy is opening a new training night starting on the 10th October, 6.30 till 8.00 at Captains Lane Youth Club, Ashton. The class will be instructed by Sensei Bentham and all ages and grades are welcome. You will then have a choice of 4 nights on which to train and this should mean you are able to fit in at least 2 sessions a week for those with very busy schedules! Hopefully, the new location will also entice new members to the club from the Ashton area.
We are also introducing CLUB SQUAD TRAINING SESSIONS which will take place on the last Thursday of every month, will last 2 hours, from 6.30 to 8.30 and is available to ALL students at the Academy. Karate Kidz will be permitted to leave after the first hour should they so wish. To encourage students to participate the sessions will be provided for HALF of the usual training fee. The first squad session will take place on MONDAY 13TH OCTOBER and will focus on KUMITE, we will then alternate sessions after this to include Kata. The aim of these sessions is to maintain and improve the high standard of our students by focusing on one area in detail during the sessions. We will also be placing an importance on team work during the sessions and try to promote a sense of comaradary amongst students, which sadly, is somewhat lacking at the moment. For those who wish to compete, we will also use the sessions as selections for tournaments. And finally, for any senior students this will also be used as an opportunity for them to gain experience in the coaching side of the club should they be interested in this.
Update 11/9/2008
Its been a while since i last wrote an update, but as happens every year there has been a lull at the club over the summer holidays & therefore not a great deal to write about. Class attendence has been low for the last month but, on returning from a holiday myself this week, i was pleased to see numbers are back up and everyone is refreshed after the summer break and rearing to go.
As we enter the back half of the year we now have the drive in the run up to the (dare i say it) xmas break, and end of year awards ceremony This campaign starts with the Northern Open tournament this Sunday, where i hope to see as many students at as possible, further mock dan gradings are planned for September and we hope to add to the club dan grade tally before the end of the year. We also have another Kyu grading and weapons seminar all planned before the end of the year, aswell as a few more tournaments which we hope to attend.
Finally, we remind you that we will now be keeping a close eye on all students to see who is deserving of the prestigious awards available at the December awards ceremony, we will be taking into account all aspects of the students such as effort in training, entusiasm, conduct before, during and after the trainings sessions and willingness to enter additional karate related events such as tournaments and seminars.
So dig in & give karate your all.
Sensei Sarah
After a grueling grading on Tuesday 29th July 2008 Billie-Jade McGuinness was awarded her first dan (junior) by Sensei Brian Bentham. Billie started training at just age 5 and after a further 5 years of training has become the youngest junior to gain dan grade at the Academy. Well done Billie, you are a real credit to the Academy.
Click HERE to view more photographs from the competition
Club Tournament
The very first Ryu Do Shotokan Childrens Challenge Tournament took place on Monday 14th July 08 and was a great success. The event kicked off at 5.30 with 28 of our karate kidz and junior students taking part and many spectators attending to cheer them on. Each student competed in both kata and kumite with the flag system and W.K.F rules in operation. The event was officiated by myself, Sensei Brian and other senior students who were kind enough to give up their time. We replicated a competition environment as closely as possible with two areas being marked out and run at the same time .
There was a lot of nerves around on the evening with it being the first time many students had competed in a competitive environment. I am pleased to say that everyone rose to the challenge and even those that were particularly nervous performed very well once on the area, after 2 hours of battling it out the eventual winners were announced and presented with awards. Of all the performances on the night there are a few which i feel must be given a special mention.
First of all Eleanor Daintith, 12th Kyu, from the Lowton Dojo only learned Kihon kata completely the week before but spend teh weekend practising and managed to give a fantastic performance on the night, surprising everyone and winning the category. Not bad for her first event with the Golborne Dojo.
Goerge Reid, 10th Kyu and Billie-Jade McGuinness 1st Kyu, were the other obvious stars of the competition with them both winning both their kata and kumite events convincingly. Whilst Billie-Jade is already a seasoned competitor at just age 10 and no doubt has lots of competition success ahead of her, George is just beginning his karate career and this was his first competitive event. From this performance he is certainly destined for success.
The aim of the event was to give everyone a taste of competitive karate and hopefully ebcourage a few to take part in future competitions as representatives of the Academy. We were very proud of everyones willingness to have a go and no one shied away from the challenge.
Well done everyone and thank you to all those that helped out, we could not have done it without you.
Photographs of the event are coming soon x
Update - 28th July 08
Kyu Gradings
Club kyu gradings take place very shortly on Thursday 7th August 08. All eligible students will be notified this week. It is very important that you attend every training session until then if you wish to grade as important grading information will be given out and crucial grading preparation done in the next few sessions. Whilst we appreciate the weather has been very warm recently, this is not an excuse to miss training and those students who we feel are not training regularly enough will not be given the opportunity to grade. On a personal note, it is very disappointing to turn up to instruct a class to find only a handful of students have turned up because of the warm weather, especially when gradings are so near, to excell at karate it requires commitment and dedication and is never going to be easy. I do note which students make the effort and train without fail and they are the ones who will be rewarded.
UPDATE - 7/7/08 Weapons Class 7th July 2008
The Academy was pleased to welcome back Sensei's McIntyre Junior & Senior for further weapons tuition on Monday 2th July 2008.
The class saw most of the Karate Kidz join the juniors and seniors for the session for the first time and going off feedback from the parents they all thouroughly enjoyed it, with no one leaving the class early.
We moved on from the Bo-staff and began some more detailed Nunchuck training, much to everyones enjoymeny. After a tentative start with students cautiously moving the nunchicks around their waist, backs and heads it was not long before they were whizzing through the air.
It was a very enjoyable class and we were very pleased to see so many students give it a go. We hope to arrange a further class towards towards the end of the year so keep checking the calender for new events.
UPDATE - 16/6/08 -
1st Ryu Do Shotokan Childrens Challenge Karate Tournament.
To encourage our younger members to take part in competitive karate & as practice for those who already compete, we are holding a club tournament on Monday 14th July.
The tournament is exclusively for our academy members, will take place instead of training on the above date and starts at 5.30pm. To get the biggest benefit from the event, all students are required to participate in both kumite and kata. The event will be officiated by sensei's and senior students, along with any parent volunteers. Please complete the form handing out during training a.s.a.p to confirm your participation at the event so that we can make the necessary arrangements. We will try to replicate tournament conditions as best we can within reason.
PLEASE make sure you attend so that we can consider holding regular club tournaments, if you dont use it - you will loose it!
Cumbrian Championships Sunday 15th June 08
Well done to Katie Hargreaves, Megan Williams, Kevin Cooper and Thomas Hindley who all took part in the tournament yesterday, you repeatedly represent the Academy at tournaments and do us proud. It takes courage to even take part n the tornaments. Although things did not go our way yesterday, things can be learnt from it and improvements made. However, we still did not come away empty handed, Well done Katie on your 2nd place in your kumite event.
Club jackets
The new club jackets have now arrived. If you have not already done so please collect your jacket from me.
2nd June 2008 - Sensei Harrison seminar
Guest Instructor Sensei Harrison visited the club on Monday 2nd of June. The session was free to all academy members and was the first in the year of the series of guest courses. The course was well attended and we were pleased to see many of the senior students training. Under Sensei Harrisons tuition we focused on the use of different stances to generate power behind techniques. We then paired up for partner work, looking at close range techniques, before working on kata and sanbon kumite to finish. As always students thouroughly enjoyed Sensei Harrisons class and look forward to having him back later in the year.
We are also currently in the process of arranging some further weapons classes to take place durin the year. Dates for these will be posted shortly.
13/4/08 - Sensei Charles Gidley Course
Students attended a seminar with Sensei Gidley 7th Dan. The 3 hour seminar began with kihon, disecting the technique and movement behind the simplest of techniques. After a short break we then moved onto kata bunkai which Sensei Gidley has vast ecperience in and is general considered to be an authority on. We demonstrated the kata and then working with a partner, practised its practical application. Everyone agrees a great deal was learned from Sense Gidley and we look forward to future courses.
7th APRIL 08 - Kyu Gradings
After a short delay the first grading of the year took place on the 7th April. As always the standard of grading was high and saw many of the karate kidz members taking their first ever formal grading. They rose to the occasion and we are very pleased with their progress, its nice to see so many of the younger students doing well. At the senior end we also had several students grading to 3rd kyu and above, now is the time to up your training efforts in preperation for your dan grades!
Sunday 30th March 2008
J.S.K.A.G Tournament - Liverpool
Well done to the students who took part in the tournament at the end of the month in Liverpool. It was the first year we have attended the event which is held on our doorstep. Well done to Kevin, Marc, Katy and Megan, pictured right, who all placed on the day.
February 2008
Training on Thursday 22/02/08 saw Sensei Brian Seabright, Chairman of the B.K.A attend the club to present Sensei Brian Bentham with his well deserved 5th Dan. During a short speech special mention was given to Sensei Benthams commitment to karate and services to the B.K.A. It was also good to see students of the Academy, past and present, make a special effort to attend the significant event in Sensei Brian's karate career.
Congratulations to Sensei Brian Bentham.
