Noah's ark sails tommorow

[Simon Keegan]

Tommorow, in Birmingham, representatives from most of the UK's Karate associations will meet to discuss a plan to save English Karate following the collapse of Karate England, the Sport England and WKF-recognised governing body.

Among the representatives are some of the most well-renowned English Karateka since the art arrived in England 50 years ago this year. Others are younger instructors keen to have their ideas heard.

There will be representatives from the JKA, the BKA, Ishin Ryu (Ticky Donovan OBE), KDI (Terry Wingrove & Tony Gray), Shikon, AMA, TISKA (Mick Billman), TASK (John Van Weenan), EKO, TEMAA and many more associations.

Each of the [approximately 90] delegates will have a radio mic and the minutes will be recorded.

I (and I'm sure all of the others attending) hope that all differences can be put aside after the deluge of disaster that has befallen English Karate and we can together make for dry land in the distance for the good of future generations.

Simon Keegan
Chairman: The Empire Martial Arts Association (TEMAA)
http://empiremartialarts.mysite.orange.co.uk
Chief Instructor: Bushinkai Academy
http://bushinkaiacademy.mysite.orange.co.uk

[Ultimate_Truth]

Just curious, what is the heritage of Bushinkai karate?

[Simon Keegan]

The humble heritage of the Bushinkai Academy is as follows:

It is not a style - our grassroots are in Shotokan, however we have a certain approach to Karate which I will detail below.

Before moving into Karate I studied various martial arts but not to any extent worth mentioning. My first main Karate teacher as a teenager was Steve Bullough under whom I trained for around eight years in a style derived for a mix of Karate styles including Shotokan, Yoseikan and Shukokai. He is now graded 6th Dan I believe. Steve awarded me my 1st Dan on December 19 1999 and I began teaching as his assistant shortly after.

I changed associations and standardised my Kata syllabus to that of Shotokan and for the last six years ago my Shotokan teacher has been Bob Carruthers (6th Dan) who studied various Shotokan/Wado based systems from the 1970s onwards under the likes of Enoeda, Suzuki, including Shotokan, Bujinkai, Shobukan and others. I still train with Bob when I get the chance, in fact I was his uke on a course last weekend (see report on seminars thread).

My other main teacher for the last four years or so has been Reiner Parsons, a regional director of Kokusai Budoin who is graded 6th Dan by the aforementioned Japanese association. Reiner graded me to 3rd Dan.

So my main teachers chronologically have been Steve Bullough, Bob Carruthers and Reiner Parsons all 6th Dan.

The name 'Bushinkai' was given to me by a Jujutsu instructor called Jamie Lee-Barron under whom I trained for a few years. I don't know his precise reasoning for the name but I liked it because linguistically it was similar to my previous style Bushidokan and also linguistically to Bujinkai.

I opened the Bushinkai Academy in February 2001. I teach only adults and have only ever graded one person to black belt and that was Steve Chriscole who has trained in Karate since 1978 (with various teachers).

In terms of our approach to Karate, I teach according to three sciences:

1) The science of Violence. Study of the habitual acts of physical violence. Patrick McCarthy has been an inspiration.

2) The science of technique. How to defend in the most efficient way and the common principles of techniques. Reiner Parsons and his teacher Tadanori Nobetsu have been an inspiration as have Terry Wingrove.

3) The science of learning. How can we drill these techniques so that they become instinctive.

So I hope I have answered your questions regarding the heritage of the Bushinkai Academy, who my teachers were/are, where the name came from and what we do.

The only final point is that my father David Keegan is a Tai Chi instructor and when he opened his own class it made sense to do so under the same banner, so I run the Karate side and he the Tai Chi side.

I'm off to Paris tommorow so I may not be on the net for some time so if you have any further queries they may have to wait :)

P.S Just got back from the meeting in Birmingham... Need a lie down....