Grand Canyon State Summer Games

Well, it's that time of year again--time for the summer edition of the Grand Canyon State Games. The summer games are usually smaller than the winter games, and this year was no exception. Still, we had few troopers who went out and did a great job representing Shihan and the Arizona Budokan again this year. As always, the instructor team worked hard to get us ready for the tournament as well.


We're especially proud of Alan, who went out and competed in long weapons and in a huge kata division after only having trained with us for a couple of months. He took third place with his bo kata, and we can't wait to see how well he does at the next tournament!

Alan competing with Kihon Ichi no Kata

Alan competing in long weapons with Sunakake no Kon

Ricky did an awesome job in both kobudo and karate, earning a medal in all four divisions. His ni-tambo kata was as solid as ever, rightfully earning him the gold. He got second place in bo and third place in both karate kata and kumite.

Ricky during his winning ni-tanbo kata

Ricky being presented with a silver medal in long weapons

Sarah was her usual unflappable self, presenting solid kata and kumite performances and earning medals in the weapons division as well. She placed first in short weapons, second in long weapons, and did a great job performing the kata Ji-in. We're proud of her!

Sarah mixing it up in kumite

Sempai Dawn also competed in the adult divisions, getting second-place medals in weapons and kata and a first-place medal in adult women's black belt kumite. The black belts fought under the new kumite rules, which require eight points to win the match instead of three. Whew!

Sempai Dawn performed Seipai in adult women's black belt kata

It took a lot of reverse punches to make it to eight points!

Congratulations again to all of the competitors, and a special thanks to Shihan, Sensei Ed, and Sempai John for coming out to support us and helping us perform at our best. We'll see you at the food drive tournament in December!!

Sensei Murayama Seminar

Some of you may remember that Shihan Kunio Murayama, an 8th dan in Shito-ryu karate, came from Mexico City to Phoenix for a training session last April. Like our Shihan, Shihan Murayama is a second-generation student to the founder of Shito-ryu, Kenwa Mabuni, and he is famous as one of the top Shito-ryu practitioners in the world.

Sensei Murayama on the cover of Masters Magazine in 2009

The seminar was a great opportunity to train with some of our martial arts "cousins" in the Shito Kai organization and compare some of the subtle differences between what they do and what we do. Murayama Sensei spent the first half of the seminar going over some interesting and very effective (ouch!!) grappling applications.

Sensei Murayama demonstrating a takedown

Murayama Sensei stressed tight, circular movements as a way to retain control of the opponent and increase the effectiveness of the technique. For example, he showed us how to add a subtle twist to this familiar arm bar in order to make it more powerful.

Sensei Murayama with Shihan, demonstrating an arm bar

As always, we were given the opportunity to work with other karateka outside of our dojo, helping us to broaden our ability to apply different techniques. In this case, almost everyone at the seminar was a Shito-ryu practitioner, but we still saw a lot of small differences, particularly when we did kata during the second half of the seminar.

Sempai Dawn working with a brown belt from another dojo

All in all it was a great experience, and those that attended were able to take home some new information as well as reinforce applications that we often do in our own dojo. A special thanks to Sensei Rabino for hosting Sensei Murayama and allowing us to attend. We had a great time and hope he comes back soon!

Brianna, Sempai Dawn, Sempai John, Shihan, and Sensei Ed with Sensei Murayama

If you want to learn more about Murayama Sensei and our cousins in the Shito-kai, you can visit his website at www.murayamashitokai.org.