The Kyu & Dan gradings, March 2024 were held at the Bournville College dojo (A.K.A. South & City College Birmingham – Longbridge Campus) over the weekends of the 16th and 23rd March with a few additional gradings taking place on Monday 25th at the Weoley Castle dojo. All of us at BWCSK would like to congratulate all those who passed their kyu gradings. Well done we were very pleased with the overall standard on display.

We also had three people going for different dan grades this time around and whilst two didn’t quite make it, I’d firstly like to congratulate all of them for choosing to request to take a black belt grading in the first place. Dan gradings are a considerably harder experience than kyu gradings by design and are the culmination of several years of training to reach the point to be able to even attempt the gradings. Many don’t pass at the first attempt but those who persist will eventually reach that goal and can reach heights many never expected, as a now high ranking sensei of mine will often tell people when describing their own karate journey. These gradings get increasingly more difficult with a greater degree of technical skill and knowledge required as you progress up the ranks.

We are very pleased to be able to offer our special congratulations Lincoln Boult who achieved his Nidan (2nd Dan) black belt. He had a very good grading and worked very hard over the last few years since passing his shodan at a relatively young age to reach this point.

We’d also like to thank Sensei Patrick Jones, 3^rd Dan, another former student of Shihan Cyril Cummins and training partner of Sensei Richard Amuzu at Enso SKC for agreeing to come and help out on the grading.

Below is a selection of pictures from the grading days from our Flickr account