Now the initial trial is over, you'll need to join the Japan Karate Association. We affiliated with them via the JSKE. Membership is annual and is £35. This is needed to grade (get your next belt). The license book you'll get through joining will enable you to grade and will contain your grading history.
Grading is entirely optional, but it is a good way to measure your progress. I haven't confirmed all the details yet, but the next grading will be on 7th December at Kelsey Kerridge Sports Centre in Cambridge (next to parkers piece). Based on previous experience, the cost is approximately £25 per person and includes a 1hr lesson with Sensei Roy Tomlin MBE.
The license books required for grading are sent from Japan and can take a while to arrive. To ensure they arrive on time for the grading, I'll be looking to complete membership applications by the middle of October.
Everyone's looking good in their new gis! I'll hopefully do a new order soon for those who are interested once they've experience a few more lessons.
We continued with practicng the basic techniques in tonight's lesson - stepping punch, rising block, outside block, lower block. We then continued on with kata practice - kihon kata and heian shodan - the first two kata that are similar to each other.