Over 70 SKR student and family members attended the Family Christmas Party held at the Thorley Community Centre in Bishops Stortford to celebrate the festive season and the successes of 2012. It was also Sensei Michael’s opportunity to present SKR Dan Grade certificates and to thank all of the SKR students and helpers who gave up their time to support the Association over the last 12 months.
Awarded SKR Dan Grade Certificates for their black belt achievement in 2012 were:
Sensei Michael also took the opportunity to present a bottle of wine with his thanks to: Sempai’s Heather Mollison, Trevor Carr, Stuart Trow, John Neil Park, Andrew Digby, Adam Bennett; David Clark, Paul & Kelly Walton, Kevin & Jacqui Mauroo, Paul & Emma Scott-Stevens, Robert Rudge and Paul Fiddler.
Sensei Michael then went on to present Book Tokens and his thanks to Junior helpers: Sempai’s Lewis Trow, Ben Clark, Thea Procter, Harry Bennett, Helena Scott-Stevens and Zoe Rutter.
Unable to attend and thanked in their absence were: Sempai’s Simon Chapman & Nick Ray.
Sensei would like to extend his thanks to Robert Rudge for the superb range of cakes & desserts expertly made by hand for the event.
Student of the Year 2012
Kanazawa Shield “Teaching by Example”
2011 was a landmark year for Karate in the United Kingdom as it saw the end of an Era. After 55 years of visiting the UK 2-3 times a year to teach Karate, and having lived in the UK between 1963 and 1965, Kanazawa Sensei chose to go into semi-retirement at the age of 80 and will not be visiting the UK again.
Sensei Kanazawa is responsible for bringing Shotokan Karate to the United Kingdom in 1964, and at the age of 80, is the only living 10th Dan in Shotokan Karate in the World. He began training in karate whilst at Takushoku University under the then-Chief Instructor of Japan karate Association, Masatoshi Nakayama and he also trained under the founder of Shotokan Karate, Gichin Funakoshi, who is recognised in Japan as the father of modern day karate.
In honour of Kanazawa Sensei and to mark his achievements and dedication to the art of Karate-do SKR introduced the Kanazawa Shield in 2010 with the intention of awarding this each year to the Karate-ka (karate student) who demonstrates true Karate spirit.
Zoe Rutter has trained regularly at the Bishops Stortford Dojo for 4½ years and has attained the rank of 1st Kyu Sho at the age of 10. Zoe has always demonstrated impeccable manners and a remarkable resilience for one of her years. In class she is the epitome of the diligent student who is attentive to instruction, hard working and focused.
Kanazawa Sensei has often commented that Children are the future of Karate and I am proud to call Zoe Rutter not only a student of Karate-do, but also a student of SKR.