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Frequenty asked Questions about
Kempo |
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Practicing responses to a
knife attack |
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>FAQ |
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This
page is (c) Guy Gratton, 2006. Please
feel free to copy or link any text, but you must say where it came from.
What is Aiki-Kempo Jiu-Jitsu?
Kempo for short, it is a modern mix of a number of ancient arts. It contains elements of Jiu Jitsu, Karate,
Kung Fu, Tai Chi and Shiatsu, including self-defence, internal balance and
healing skills. Kempo is regarded as a “soft” martial art – which
means that is doesn’t require lots of physical strength or involve regular
abrupt physical movements. Is this a self defence class? Yes and no. What you’ll learn is no substitute for
keeping yourself out of harms way but will teach you practical self defence
skills. How fit do I need to be? And will it help make me
fit? Normal everday fitness is enough (i.e. if
you can make it from the car park, up the stairs, and into the dojo or
training hall), and yes, Kempo it will help you improve your personal fitness
and health – most people also find that it does a lot to reduce stress and
improve their self-awareness. If you
have any ongoing illness or injury, this shouldn’t be a problem, but please
tell your instructor at the beginning of your first session. Who is the instructor? The instructor (Sensei) is Guy Gratton, who is qualified by the British Kempo Society (BKS) and trained under Sensei Warren Palmer at Monxton Kempo club in Hampshire. For copies of his qualifications, and our insurance certificate, please see the Certificates page. What should I wear? If you have any kind of martial arts suit
or “Gi” that’s great – please wear it, but with a white belt please unless
you’ve graded at another BKS club. For
everybody else, a comfortable track suit or similar clothing is fine. Most ladies prefer for their own comfort to
wear a sports bra. Normal footwear in the training room is
bare feet. If there’s a good reason
why you can’t go without footwear, then clean martial arts “mat shoes” or
plimsoles are fine – but not shoes that have been worn outdoors. Finally – ABSOLUTELY NO JEWELLERY. This is for everybody’s protection, Kempo involves movement and
contact and any jewellery can cause injury, most likely to the wearer. Does age matter?
Not really, although for safety and
insurance reasons the minimum age is 14. If you are younger, and would like to train
in a similar martial art, please look on the links page – there are a few
good local martial arts clubs linked there, and we’d be glad to see you when
you turn 14, either instead or as-well. Is this a class or a club? It is a club,
run under the auspices of Wycombe Leisure Limited on their Aerobics class
timetable. Will I get hurt? We do
everything reasonably possible to avoid anybody getting hurt or injured at Bucks
Kempo. But, being honest the
occasional bruise is probably inevitable, and some risk of injury is unavoidable
if our training is worth anything. Are there any extra costs? If you are
serious, you’ll need to buy a gi (Jiu Jitsu suit). These cost around £15 for junior gis, and
around £30 for senior gis, depending upon size. You’re welcome to buy these anywhere, but
we can usually get them for you cheaper than shop prices. The club has
all the training equipment you should need, although obviously there’s
nothing to stop you buying your own training weapons and so on – most club
members however don’t. Occasionally we
go to courses or seminars outside Marlow; these are never compulsory
(although good fun), and usually inexpensive – rarely more than about £30 for
a weekend, or half that for a day.
Often the traditional Chinese meal afterwards is more expensive! Do you mind me training in
another martial art as well? On the
contrary, it can only help – and if you learn anything good, please bring it
back and show us. But my instructor says that I
shouldn’t learn another martial art as well as his? Ask yourself,
why is he worried about this? I run another local martial
arts club I’d love to hear from you – let’s see what we can do to
help each other out. I am disabled, does this matter? The short answer is that I don’t
know. Clearly some disabilities are
likely to preclude this sort of martial arts training – but please phone or
come and have a chat. If it’s reasonably
possible, then yes we’d love to have you in the club. Do you have links with Shorinji
Kempo, Kempo Karate, Dillman Karate…? No, what they
do is probably great, but we have no formal links with them. If a club isn’t shown as BKS on the links
page of this website, we have no formal relationship with them. This is just down to the enormous
complexity of the worldwide martial arts community. What weapons work do you do? Weapons work is
not the main part of our Kempo, but we do practice attacks and defences with
knives, single and double sticks, and some use of improvised weapons. Whilst we’re primarily a defensive martial
art, we do teach some offensive techniques so that we understand what we’re
training to defend ourselves against. Where and when do you train? Court Garden
Leisure Complex, which is the leisure centre next to |
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Bucks Kempo Website.
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