Davin passed his latest test on September 8th. Here he is showing off his yellow-striped white belt certificate. A good reason to smile. Congratulations.
Here she is, Abigail holding her first promotional certificate and she now has her 1-tip. Looks pretty serious, doesn’t she. Well, tests are serious stuff and she showed what it takes to pass with good scores. Congratulations.
Kylli shows off her 2-Tips certificate. She passed her test on August 23, 2016 and scored very well. Now on to the yellow-striped belt material and soon we’ll see her here again. Congratulations, Kylli!
On August 18th Evan took his first test and passed with a good score. He did very well and made everyone proud – congratulations! Here he is with his new certificate.
Here’s Nick, thumbs up for sure, showing off his sankyu (brown belt) certificate. He passed his test on August 16th with flying colors. He has always been a courageous karateka and this latest promotion is just one more example of how Nick sticks to it and gets it done. Congratulations.
Here’s Elizabeth holding her 2-tips certificate. She passed her test on August 9th and did very well – congratulations!
Here’s Amarianna showing off her new certificate. She passed her 2-tips test on July 28, 2016 after a lot of hard work and she did really well. Congratulations!
We have a new black belt! Congratulations to Daniel Markovich on earning his shodan rank. He worked hard and did a great job!
Mike only started training a few months ago, but he works hard and it shows. He passed his first test with some strong techniques and is already working towards his next belt. Congratulations Mike!
Elizabeth did a great first test and earned her 1-tip on March 29th. Here she is with her certificate. Now to get going and catch up to her brother!
Laura holds up her yellow belt certificate earned on March 22nd. A great test, but not without a bump or two. Great job!
Julia is all smiles with her 1-tip certificate. She was nervous (aren’t we all that first test?) but still did a great job!
Here is Davin with his 2-tips certificate, earned on March 10th. He really tried hard to hit all nines and came pretty close. Great job, Davin – keep it up!
Graydon holds up his gokyu certificate. He passed his test on March 10th and did a fine job, as usual. Congratulations!
Amarianna shows off her 1-Tip certificate earned on March 3rd. A good showing on her first test!
John passed his first test and shows off his certificate. He put in a lot of work, especially learning the Japanese terms, and then did a fine job on his test. Congratulations, John.
On October 4th, 2014, Dan Means and Jo Bonanno completed the challenge and earned their new dan* ranks.
Back row: Kraig Schlosser, godan (5th dan), Carolyn Berg, yondan (4th dan), James Brumbaugh, rokudan (6th dan), Terry Sanders, hanshi, Bruce Baird, yondan (4th dan).
Following the new dan promotions, in a low-key but much appreciated ceremony, Terry Sanders, hanshi promoted Sensei Kraig Schlosser to sichidan (7th dan) and Sensei Jim Brumbaugh to hachidan (8th dan).
*Dan (pronounced “don”) is the Japanese term for black belt rank. For example, rokudan means 6th dan or 6th degree black belt.
The title of Hanshi means a senior expert, considered a “teacher of teachers”. Hanchi Sanders is the highest ranking person in our style of karate and the style head of Shorei-ryu.
James wins the August 2014 Odayaka Poker Tournament.
An Odayaka-style Poker Tournament is a unique contest in which the players must demonstrate excellent karate techniques in order to get a card. Each student gets seven cards and the best poker hand wins. It was a close contest with both James and Evan holding flushes, but James’ was just a bit higher. Great competition everyone!
It was noted in adult class on August 12th, 2014, that we had a kyu rank representing every belt color in our system from white to brown.
Nice to have a full house!