Shōgatsu 2025
Shimekazari, a traditional Japanese New Year decoration
Shōgatsu (正月) is the Japanese word for New Years, and now that the first week of 2025 has passed, we feel it is a good idea to reflect on the year that has ended and look forward to the year ahead of us. The INKKS was founded at the end of 2023, making 2024 our first official year of operation, and in that time, we have been able to accomplish quite a bit for being such a new organization. A popular New Years tradition in Japanese culture is to share a poem from Manyōshū (lit. “Collection of Ten Thousand Leaves”), an ancient collection of poetry attributed to Otomo no Yakamochi, who was the collection’s last editor. Poem 4516 is specifically about New Years Day, although it was written when Japan still celebrated only the lunar new year, which will be January 29th of 2025, and it certainly sums up our hopes for everyone going into the new year!
Like snow,
Falling on this New Year's day of spring,
May you pile up,
Joyous things.It is also tradition to write poetry that focuses on the theme of “firsts” in the new year, such as the first rain, or your first laughter, or the first training session. With that in mind, we felt a karate-related haiku would be in order.
Tijikun bushi
Warriors past and present
Sharing their knowledgeWe don’t claim to be skilled poets, but this does embody the goals of the INKKS; to bring together martial artists from all over the world, and bring not only their knowledge and skill together, but the knowledge left to us by warriors of the past, in order to bring karate and kobudo into the future.
Past Events
A screenshot from our webinar with Don Came Sensei
In 2024, the INKKS held a total of 15 events, 14 of which were online seminars, and 1 which was our inaugural full-day seminar held in West Plains, MO, featuring instruction from 4 of the 5 founding Board Members of the organization. The vast majority of these events featured instruction by our esteemed Advisors, and we would like to take a moment to publicly thank them for offering their expertise to our members.
Dr. R.H. Gutierrez, Modern Science and Kyusho, The Skeletal System and Karate
Don Came, Naihanchi Bunkai
Chris Denwood, Solo Padwork
Drake Sass, Signature Kata Techniques
Sai Tuidi, Drake Sass
Jeb Chiles, Tegumi/Grappling Fundamentals
Dan Djurdjevic, Jodo
Of course, we are also eternally grateful for all of the rest of our Advisors, and we look forward to bringing our members opportunities to train with all of the INKKS Advisors in the years to come! In addition, we would like to recognize our founding Board Members for their efforts in providing additional training opportunities to our members.
Nathan Ogden, Aragaki Seisan,
Paul Musolf, Kakiya Training
Noah Legel, Tachimura no Naihanchi, Kakedameshi: The Original Kumite of Karate
Kyle Doan, Matsumura Walking Drills, Power Generation
Ron Gillespie Jr., Kicking and Flexibility
Future Events
While the year is still young, and we are still in the planning stages, we already have two in-person events planned for 2025. The first event is a Wansu Bunkai Seminar with INKKS co-founder and Board Member, Noah Legel, which will be held from 2-4pm on January 25th at Heartland Dojo in Roanoke, IL. This event only costs $15 for INKKS and World Combat Association members, and will be made available via Zoom, as well as being taught in-person. The second event we have planned is our inaugural INKKS Summer Gasshuku, which we intend to make an annual event going forward. The Gasshuku will be held at the Pine Ridge Scout Camp in Makanda, IL, from July 25th-27th, and we currently have the following sessions tentatively planned, with a few more in the works. The Summer Gasshuku is shaping up to be an excellent opportunity to learn from a variety of skilled instructors, while making friends and memories that will last a lifetime!
Ron Hill, Standing Grappling and Ground Finishes
Gary Sass, Shu Chu (Kubotan) Fundamentals
Jeb Chiles, Practical Yakusoku Kumite Drills
Drake Sass, Bunkai of Signature Kata Movements
Michael Nguyen (Karate Breakdown/Karate Culture), Advanced Grappling Concepts for Karate
Noah Legel, Tachimura no Naihanchi Kata and Bunkai
Ken Phillips (Hand-Selected by George Mattson), Uechi-Ryu Sanchin “The Old Way”
Dr. R.H. Gutierrez, Yamanni-Ryu Bojutsu or Q&A on the Effect of Karate Techniques on the Body
As we did in 2024, we intend to host a number of online training sessions for our members in 2025. This year, however, in addition to using our founding Board Members and Board of Advisors, we are putting out an open call to our members, inviting you to possibly teach one of these online sessions! If you feel you have something to teach that would benefit the community and help people make their karate and/or kobudo more neoclassical or practical in nature, and you are willing to teach a 1-2 hour seminar via Zoom, please contact us and we will work with you to discuss plans! Be sure to follow our Facebook Page and join our Facebook Group to stay up-to-date with all of our future events and learning opportunities!
Training Goals
It is important to set goals for yourself in life and in your martial arts training, and of course we all know the tradition of New Year’s Resolutions. We encourage everyone to write down their goals for the year, and be sure that they are SMART—this means that they are Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Relevant, and Time-bound. Goals that are too vague, hard to measure, hard to achieve, not relevant to what you want to achieve overall, or not attached to a particular time frame (although this is rarely an issue with New Year’s Resolutions, by their nature), will almost inevitably end in disappointment. With that in mind, we hope that you are able to achieve every goal you set for yourself, and we have a few in mind for the INKKS as an organization.
Sign up more members in 2025 than we did in 2024
Host at least 3 in-person training events spread throughout the year
Host at least 10 virtual training events spread throughout the year
Complete the development of an on-demand online training program
We hope to see many of you in the coming year, either in-person or online, as we continue to grow and help more people bring their karate into the future while honoring the past!
