Winter 2019 Classes

Our karate classes will continue through the holidays into the New Year on the same nights and times. But in December and the beginning of January, there will be three class cancellations:

• Thursday, December 6, 2018 (church event)
• Tuesday, December 25, 2018 (Christmas)
• Tuesday, January 1, 2019 (New Year’s Day)

We will have a class as usual between the holidays, on Thursday, December 27. Of course, many people will be away on holiday, so attendance will boil down to a few diehards. The first class of the new year will be held on Thursday, January 3, 2019.

Ontario Karate Federation

In the new year, our karate club will belong to the Ontario Karate Federation. This is the government-recognized association that approves and runs the tournaments that select teams that go to the national championships, which then fields a national team for international events such as the Olympics in Japan, where karate will be an exhibition sport.

The OKF runs a number of tournaments through the year for elite athletes and recreational competitors. It will include information on its events page.

For members who are interested in competing, I will provide more information in upcoming newsletters. Club members can either compete in kata (forms) or kumite (sparring divisions), or both. For kata, you only need your uniform and to know a few forms, since each round you move forward in the competition you need to perform a different kata.

For kumite, competitors need to have WKF (World Karate Federation)-approved equipment, which includes a body shield and two sets of gloves and shin guards (red and blue sets). I will source and price these things for those who are interested (and of course, the equipment can also be used in class).

I will also find out what mouth guards and groin protection are necessary.

Besides the OKF tournaments, we will still run our small, annual in-house competition. And I’ll also see if the other Ryusei karate clubs in Ontario in our style would be interested in running a small tournament for kids, probably in the fall.

Fees

In the new year, we will get start get the member insurance the church requires us to have to run classes in its building from the OKF. While I don’t expect we will have to pay more doing this, our club members will have to pay this part of their annual fee directly to the OKF online. I’ll provide more information about this later.

The other part of the fee is the money that goes to Japan to register members as part of the Ryusei karate style. The amount depends on exchange rate between the Canadian dollar and Japanese yen.

For the last few years, the annual fees (combining insurance and style fees) have been $65 for kids, $80 for adults and $120 for black belts, with discounts for larger family groups. I hope we can keep to this same amount for the new year, but I will confirm this after the holidays.

As far as member fees, the church raised our rent for first time in a few years, last September. So I have to raise our member fees slightly to accommodate this, adding $5 to the existing fees for three-month blocks of lessons. So kids fees will be $85 for three months and adults will pay $140.

If someone has already paid for lessons in the new year, I will honour the lower rate that I quoted you.

Snow-Day Cancellations

If the weather gets bad enough (or some other urgent reason comes up), I will cancel classes by sending out an email to members and by doing a post on our Facebook page. If you have any questions about class cancellations, you can reach me by email or phone (416-729-5633).

Testing

We held a test for the kids class last Thursday. I will email the results out before our Tuesday night class. And I will hold a belt award next week, on Tuesday (if our supplier has belts in stock).

Just a note to parents, if a child needs some more work to pass their belt test, I will give them a stripe for their current belt (to recognize their hard work and continuing progress), and then look at their technique again on Tuesday, January 15, so they can achieve their full new belt ranking.

I will bill for the test ($25), when your child has their full belt ranking, on your next email invoice.

If you have any questions about this process, please speak to me in class or on the phone.

Have a great holiday.

—Peter Giffen