OTHER PROGRAM CHANGES

Tora Do Karate will now be known as Tora Do Combatives.  Things change, times change, society changes, and with those changes, Martial Arts systems must evolve in order to remain effective.  

We’ve been slowly modernizing and adapting our youth karate program over the years to place an added emphasis on real-world situations and techniques to keep our students safe as well as competitive.  Sensei Bailey and Shihan D have witnessed the unfortunate watering-down of many traditional systems over time and have always believed that this system has always gone above and beyond to keep it’s elements of self defense relevant to current times.  

Considering this and the unfortunate realization in current years that most Traditional Martial Arts competitions are shells of what they once were, we have placed an added emphasis on the elements of Boxing, Muay Thai, Grappling and Krav Maga that have been integrated into the system.  In order to properly reflect this, we have elected to both maintain and increase this emphasis, as well as to modify the name of the program to be more inclusive of the integrations into the system.  

We believe that we can continue to instill the core values of discipline, focus, and honor that represent Traditional Martial Arts while also continuing to emphasize the evolution of the system.   

This will continue to be a belted system and students who progress to the rank of black belt will earn a recognized traditional black belt in Tora Do Karate, however, we will no longer:

  • Require the knowledge of traditional katas (under black belt)

  • Conduct scheduled testing (students will be promoted on the spot when the instruction staff believes they have exhibited the necessary skills in order to progress to the next rank)

  • Require the used of a traditional karate gi

We have made other changes such as:

  • allowing the use of both traditional and non-traditional sparring gear

  • modifying the uniform

  • Limiting competition to primarily non-traditional competitions (traditional martial arts tournaments however will be open to those students who would like to continue to participate in them)

  • Increasing the minimum age from age 7 to age 8 with additional requirements (this is due to the median age of students enrolled in this program pre-COVID being 11-13+).  

STUDENTS WILL NOT LOSE THEIR RANK and will be allowed to continue to learn and practice the traditional techniques they’re used to if they so desire.  (Don’t worry, Daren!  You are still welcome to work on your beautifully crisp katas if you’d like to.) We aren’t omitting curriculum, just shifting our focus to a more practical skillset. The Tora Do Karate you’ve all come to know and love isn’t going anywhere…it’s just evolved into Tora Do Karate “on steroids,’ aka Tora Do Combatives.

Don’t worry, this will be a change enjoyed by all and you won’t have to worry about Sensei Bailey uttering those dreaded words on an otherwise great day: “I think we should work on kata today.” *cue the collective groan.”