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Black and Brown Belt CourseHounslow 14th January 2012
The three hour course started on time with 15 minutes of excellent warm up exercise taken by the Junior Squad Coach Jodie Pidcock. The course was divided into two main parts of an hour and half each with only a few minutes break in the middle. As usual, the three hours flew by and Sensei Ohta's brilliant teaching and fantastic demonstrations gave the 100 lucky JKA members, who attended the course, many techniques to choose from and to practice, in order to improve their skills in preparation for their next Dan Grading. Sensei Ohta made also sure that everyone got the chance to practice Kumite. Sensei Adel Ismail, Sensei Roy Tomlin and Sensei Gary Stewart did not let anyone get away with a wrong technique or a bad habit! They were patrolling the hall and giving help and advice to all the students. In the first half of the course, Sensei Ohta showed us different Kumite combinations that we practiced firstly individually, then by pairing up according to height and gender. Some of the combinations consisted of stepping forward with sanbon-zuki and stepping back with blocking combinations (age- uke, soto- uke, uchi- uke, gedan-barai). Other combinations consisted of kicks and punches (mae- geri , mawashi- geri and oi-zuki jodan/ chudan and gyaku-zuki). Sensei Ohta stressed that each technique must be performed with a strong and stable stance. He also reiterated the importance of coordination (For example to step and finish the punch at the same time), the breathing technique, hip rotations and locking. The importance of blocking and countering rapidly while keeping the right distance between the attacker and the defender was also highlighted several times by Senei Ohta. The second half of the course was divided into two parts to cover all brown belt kata and Kumite. The students were split into four groups according to which kata would they like to practice for their next Dan Grading.
The second part was dedicated to Kumite and free sparring. In the first 15 minutes Sensei Ohta made sure to allow all Brown Belts the chance to pair up with a squad member according to age and gender to practice Kumite. This was a brilliant opportunity for brown belts to learn and improve their techniques and skills in Kumite. This was followed by dividing the students into five groups: Male 16+, Female 16+, Juniors 13- 15 years old, Juniors under 13 years old and finally students who need to pass kata only in their next Dan Grading. Sensei Ohta wanted the students to experience the pressure and the intensity of the grading while getting helpful and useful tips to enhance their skills in Kumite.
The course was very successful, well organised and finished on time. But more importantly we all benefited a lot from this brilliant course and the excellent teaching of Sensei Ohta. Pairing up with the squad members, who were very helpful, supportive and down to earth, was very beneficial and a big plus. We hope that all students who attended this course went back home, like us, with lots of combinations and techniques to enhance their Kumite skills and lots of tips to improve their kata performance. Shahinaz Pelter (1st Kyu)
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The Lampton Sports Centre in Hounslow, was the venue for the first regional Brown & Black Belts training Course for 2012. The course was well attended and some of the students came not only from the South East region but also from as far as Bristol and Newark.
Each group then got the chance to practice its kata many times, step by step, and to ask any questions related to that particular kata to the Sensei in charge of each group: Sensei Gary Stewart ( Bassai-Dai), Sensei Adel Ismail ( Kanku-Dai), Sensei Roy Tomlin ( Empi) and Junior Squad Coach Jodie Pidcock (Jion). 
Sensei Ohta also invited senior black belts, who wanted to practice and learn the rules of judging Kumite, to try it and give it a go under the coaching and help of the more experienced judges and referees.