Mumeishi 2015

Two of our youngest students competed at the international Mumeishi kendo competition in London. I am very proud to say that they did amazing. Leon who participated in the 10yr to 12yr age group fought his way to the final and won silver. Lacee who was competing for her first time in any competition, won a bronze medal in the 6yr to 9yr group. Congratulations to both of them for their hard work, dedication and martial spirit.

BKA grading at Stoke

During the recent BKA grading at Stoke, the Westaways, father and son, demonstrated the quality of their Kendo and thus were awarded their BKA yondan and BKA ikkue grades. Congratulations to both of them! You make us all proud!

Indoor suburi

Have you ever wanted to do a bit of practice at home? Unless you have a house with very tall ceilings, doing suburi at home is very difficult. So here is my solution to the problem: using a spare bokken and with the skillful help of Lewis from Torbay Guitar Repairs, I got the perfect indoor suburi bokken!

Lewis cut down my bokken, and even drilled holes, so bolts can be attached to add weight. Its only 45cm long, so it clears my ceiling perfectly.

Barefoot running

Apparently, barefoot running is becoming trendy. However, in Kendo, we always run barefoot. This is an interesting video which talks about the importance of good technique used in barefoot running. I found it specially interesting when thinking of fumikomi: The video shows that there is a greater impact on the runner when landing on the heel, and that this impact can lead to long term injuries. When doing fumikomi, one should also avoid landing on the heel to avoid injuries. In my humble opinion, this video highlights the importance of good fumikomi technique.

Growing in number

Over the last few months, the club has grown in numbers. It is great to see so many of us training together and helping each other to improve our Kendo. May the club continue to do so well and may we all continue to share the path for a long time.

Grading February 2013

Monday 18th February we had the honour and privilege of having Fujii Sensei come down to our dojo for our Club Grading. It was great seeing everyone do their best, well done all!

More important than ranks and grades, it was a great training session and we all benefited from Sensei's advice and pointers.

Club Grading

A date for everyone’s calendar: 18th of February we have the honour of Sensei Fujii 7 dan kioshi travelling up to Plymouth. Sensei has agreed to carry out our Club Grading on that day (the grading is for club members only). Please do not miss this opportunity as there will not be another grading for at least 3 months. We all have work to do between now and then, so let's all train hard!