Black belt grading are one of the highlights of any Karateka’s journey, they are also tough, the black belt gradings at Shiryodo Karate are no exception to this. The day started at 9:00am with meditation. At the start of a black belt promotion many people will be quite nervous, this is a chance for them to clear their mind and prepare for the day ahead. After this Chewy, Andrew and Tim then talked about their essays and what the promotion and journey to black belt had meant to them.

          

Click images above to see their posts on their individual journeys to black belt.

This was followed by 4 hours of general grading, testing all aspects of their training and karate knowledge. All did extremely well, pushing themselves at every challenge to do their best.

After a doing a board break it was then a short break for lunch before sparring.

Then after all that came the hard part, 40 rounds of sparring. Each one of them was pushed and each one of them kept pushing.

An outstanding effort by each of them. Proud to have them now training as black belts at the dojo.

Osu.