Looking back at our last 12 months, 2024 has been a truly fantastic year for Sonchō Karate Club full of busy lessons, seminars, competitions, gradings, new friendships, personal progresses, fundraising and supporting local causes.
We had some fantastic senior instructors teach us, Julie Nicholson, John Holdsworth, Simon Bligh and Steve Bailes Senseis came to share their knowledge and experiences with us and Natalie went to share her passion for karate teaching alongside Sensei Bob Rhodes early in the year.
We regularly trained at the squad trainings and competed at different regional, national and international competitions. As a club we managed to bring home a total of 25 medals. We also gained more fantastic experiences refereeing at local and not so local competitions. Many thanks to our fantastic coaches and mentors who have been supporting us, keeping us sharp and focused, and we look forward to gaining more experience at future championships.
Our annual FairFight fundraiser was a great success with friends from Tamerton Karate Club, Ridgeway Shotokan Karate Club, Kanshin Karate Club, Sanjo Karate Preston, Hadashi Senshi Do Karate, supporting us and helping us raise an incredible £580! Many thanks to Amanda and Leah who offered to help us with the refereeing on the day and to Alice and Steve for their support too!
We had students from other clubs and associations train with us regularly while staying in the area and we went to train at other clubs that we share the same vision with - karate without borders. This support and collaboration with other clubs is highly appreciated by Soncho Karate Club, as well as, all karateka who wish to learn more or simply train in a supportive environment. We are proud to receive and provide these training opportunities, bringing communities together.
We traveled to seminars all over England, Jersey, France and Ireland, clocking in an incredible 7,100 miles visiting clubs in England alone, having great karate adventures, training with and learning from Senseis Scott Langley, Guy Brodeur, Rick Hotton, Bob Rhodes, Julie Nicholson, John Holdsworth, Tom Kompier, Jason Cunningham, Andrea Carbon, Simon Bligh, Paul Uren, Justin Beattie, Ross Stewart, Stuart Amos, John Parnell, Lucie Marsh, Arianna Jennings, Kate Taylor, Chris Mulville, Neil Jerome, Steve Bailes, Shinichiro Takenoshita and Daisuke Watanabe.
Natalie and Maryse held their Nijushiho workshop which helped them test their grading kata under pressure, sharing their applications and knowledge. We pride ourselves in the improvements in confidence and new friendships we have seen to grow in the club. We all work together towards achieving our goals, we support each other and we celebrate each milestone everyone reaches.
We had kyu gradings with 55 successful passes in 2024.
The club saw Charlie successfully pass his Shodan test under Senseis Julie Nicholson, John Holdsworth and Paul Uren.
Natalie and Maryse worked incredibly hard, training 5-6x a week, learning from senior instructors, and they both successfully passed their Sandan grading under Senseis Scott Langley and Shinichiro Takenoshita.
We are grateful for the support from other clubs and karate friends who share the same passion for karate with us, invite us to their events and allow us to train with them. Our vision is to train with everyone and anyone and we are very lucky to be part of such a wonderful supportive karate community.
There are many people to thank who have helped us, supported us and who believed in us! We have created a special bond with many great karateka and have met lots of wonderful people in 2024.
Looking forward to many more karate adventures! 2025 has got loads in store for us!
We are back to regular training from Tuesday 7th January and we look forward to seeing everyone in the dojo!
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