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Our kind of members: the layered journey from white to black belt at CARISMA

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At CARISMA, we don’t just teach kickboxing; we live it. Our passion, at least the one of the keen members and instructors, lies in the grit, the technique, and the personal evolution that comes from stepping into our training hall. We are an open door for anyone—regardless of where they start—who is ready to explore their potential and reap the physical and mental rewards of martial arts. However, we don’t just “collect” members. We nurture martial artists. We view our community through five distinct layers of progression, reflecting a member’s rank, commitment, and the sharpening of their character.

Layer 1: the foundation (White, Yellow, and Orange)

Every journey begins with the first step, in this case, with the courage to be a beginner. In this initial stage, we look for consistency:

  • Expectation: training 2–3 times out of our 4 weekly classes.
  • Focus: building the habit. This is where you learn the language of kickboxing and start conditioning your body for what’s to come.

As people are training consistently the instructors start noticing some people sticking out from the crowd; they attend regularly, they quickly become known faces. Some of them turn up early and trying to practice and apply techniques which are not working for them, until they do.

Layer 2: the transformation (Orange Second, Green and Green Second Belts)

For those who are committed enough to last for about 1 year of steady sweat, the “newbie” shell starts to crack. We expect to see a visible shift in their physical capabilities:

  • Physicality: fitness, strength, endurance and flexibility starts to be noticeably higher.
  • Technicality: punches are crisper, kicks are faster, guard is constantly protecting and movements are more intentional. Even on a gentle sparring they are no longer as easy to hit with basic punches and kicks.
  • Dedication: this is where we see an “increased dedication”—the realization that martial arts isn’t just a hobby, but a discipline and more of a weekly habit.

Here we notice a small number of members who become keener and keener; they get involved in sparring and try their first fight, usually light contact.

Layer 3: the ascent (Blue and Brown Belts)

This is the “extra mile” phase. By the time they reach Blue Belt, the Black Belt is no longer a distant dream—it’s a visible point on the horizon:

  • Blue Belt: we notice members pushing beyond the standard curriculum. Coordination becomes second nature, and sparring moves from “surviving” to “competing competently.”
  • Brown Belt: this is the penultimate step. At this stage, we want members who are hungry for the graduation. They aren’t just practicing; they are preparing to represent the club at the highest student level.

Some exceptional individuals, can be selected to become assistant instructors and offered to get involved in helping out.

Layer 4: the new beginning (Black Belt)

For many, the Black Belt is seen as the finish line. At CARISMA, we see it as the new starting point. “From White to Black Belt takes roughly four years of intense, dedicated training. But once that belt is tied, the real journey begins.” This is where the dedicated martial artist truly begins to shine. The technique is ingrained, the fitness is peak, and the mind is disciplined. You’ve graduated from learning the craft to mastering the art.

Layer 5: instructors and coaches

Many of the members who became black belt at CARISMA over the years had a position as instructors.  Some instructors achieved this position without yet wearing a black belt. At CARISMA we select very carefully who are those dedicated and technically sound members who have the knowledge and personality to run classes. We expect a very high level of dedication and consistency to training and fitness to ensure all instructors can show and do every technique we practice as well as being able to teach and coach any member around techniques, blocks, guard, footwork and sparring methodologies.

The CARISMA timeline

While everyone moves at their own pace, here is a general look at the commitment required:

Milestone Timeframe Primary Focus
White to Orange Months 1–12 Consistency & Core Basics
Green Belts Year 1–2 Fitness, Speed & Strength
Blue to Brown Year 2–4 Sparring, Coordination & Dedication
Black Belt 4+ Years Mastery & Advanced Practice

Whether you are here to get fit or to eventually wear the Black Belt, we are ready to help you push your limits. The question is: are you ready to find your layer?

Back to training

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We are pleased to announce that we are re-starting our classes after the COVID-19 pandemic break.

The restrictions which are still in place will not allow us to exercise at our full potential and train with partners for the moment.  For this reason our first month(s) of post-COVID activities will have a restricted time table, matched by a reduced monthly fee. The lessons we can offer at the moment will be very similar to the ones in my videos which you can watch by following this link: contactless, COVID safe and still lot of fun.  We will be offering the following:

  • Opening from 1st September
  • 3 lessons per week, Tue and Thurs at 7, Sunday at 5 at Kelsey Kerridge
  • 1 hour lessons
  • 20 minutes warm-up followed by 40 minutes techniques and combinations in front of the mirror with shadow boxing
  • classes limited to 21 people max (at Kelsey Kerridge), including instructors
  • Monthly fees at 50% of your current fee charged by direct debit (or cash for the few who were paying cash)
  • We’ll continue these terms and schedule until further relaxation of COVID restrictions when we can hopefully go back to standard training regime and schedule

We are looking forward to seeing many of you back at training; please join us from 1st September at 7pm.

Enjoying the British weather so far

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2013-07-21 18.50.27When CARISMA started, back in 1999, we were very often training in the beautiful parks of Cambridge, mostly Jesus Green.  That kind of a tradition has been kept over the years and we sometimes use parks when, for random reasons, some of our venues becomes unavailable and the weather is nice.  We also book all Sunday lessons for the summer (usually the whole July and August) to be run outside in one of the parks and, just if the weather is not good, we book at the last minute an available room for the day.

This year we have been lucky: so far all of the (5) Sundays we managed to train outside, enjoying the lovely weather and the sun.  If you have not tried yet please make sure you join us at one of our next Sunday lessons before end of August.  Here are a few pictures of the lessons we run:

Kickboxing for stress and exams

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OllieOsunkunleOlaoluwakitan ‘Ollie’ Osunkunle (pictured here with his belt representing the national title he won in May 2013) is a CARISMA member who is leaving us this month after training very hard and regularly for 6 years.  Ollie joined us when he first started studying at the University of Cambridge for his medical degree which he achieved last month.  In 6 years with us he won several fights against various university teams as well in open regional and national competitions and he was awarded a 1st Dan black belt just a couple of weeks before his medical degree.  In his latest fight, weeks before his final exams, he won a national title.

One thing I often pointed out as a remark to his dedication was the consistency of his training regardless of the time of the year; he was one of the few university students that kept training during exam terms so I asked him to write a short article where he describes in his own words the experience of studying hard for a very demanding degree and, at the same time, train hard to be ready to fight at national level.  Here is his article:

            7 am. I fling myself bolt upright in bed. Letting out a great yawn, I do some simple stretches as I try to clear my mind for the day ahead. One day left. This is it. After six years of medical school; dissecting dead bodies; chemistry practicals and endless exams. This is it. My final exam before I hopefully earn the right to call myself doctor.

I sit at my desk and read through my list of tasks for the day ahead, there is only one decision left to make. “6.30pm → Kickboxing – sparring training”, can I make it? Of course, now let me explain why.

I studied medicine in Cambridge University. During my exam periods I kept my exercise routine as near to normal as possible. During the couple of months prior to my exams, I took part in the Oxford vs. Cambridge varsity match, won a national kickboxing competition and achieved my black belt in kickboxing. These achievements are by no means out of the ordinary and I know many other students that have kept up far more extensive sports participation.

I believe that there are a few key reasons why people give up on their exercise routines in the run-up to a major exam. Firstly, the threat of the impending exam causes the body to enter into a state of stress. In this state, people stop working to achieve their goals and instead struggle desperately to relieve themselves of their stress. Spending hours sat in front of study books is one such technique to relieve stress. However, those hours spent are often in excess of what is productive. A change is as good as a rest.

Secondly, with a prepared study plan and objectives to achieve before the exam, one might believe that there is simply not enough time to study and exercise in the same day. The disease of “time excusitis”. However, for most people, this is simply not the case. Working more efficiently: smarter rather than harder allows ample time for exercise in one’s day. Application of key principles such as Pareto’s law, commonly known as the 80/20 rule allows one to reduce the amount of material to learn. After all, 80% of the key information to learn will be covered in 20% of the available materials. Combined with Parkinson’s law, known as the law of forced efficiency, reducing the amount of time you have available to study forces you to focus on only the most relevant and high-yield data. Taking time out to kickbox helps you study smarter.

Thirdly, there is the worry of the biological effects that kickboxing may have on your body. After all, you may worry: “won’t I be too tired to study if I spend all my energy exercising?” Fortunately, the reverse is usually true. Exercise acts as a great stress reliever. Whilst a small amount of stress improves performance, large amounts have been shown to be detrimental to performance (1). In addition, exercise has been shown to improve memory, a great benefit prior to exams! (2)

So the next time you’re contemplating spending an extra hour in front of the books or heading to class, pick up your gloves and remember that there’s really only one correct choice to make. Punch away.

1.    L P. Emotionality and the Yerkes-Dodson Law. J Exp Psychol. 1957;54(5):345–52.

2.    Stroth S, Hille K, Spitzer M, Reinhardt R. Aerobic endurance exercise benefits memory and affect in young adults. Neuropsychol Rehabil. 2009;19(2):223–43.

Training when injured

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Alex training with a broken footThere is quite common saying, in traditional martial arts schools, when you hurt one of your hands or feet: “you have another hand and two feet, you can still fight!”

In today’s world of health & safety regulations and “better safe than sorry” attitude many people in position of responsibility, like doctors, instructors, teachers or lawyers tend to default toward a safe behaviour when unsure: stop training and rest until healed.

If I followed this rule I would have probably trained about a third of the total time I actually did.  When training martial arts (but also other contact sports) injuries do happen, however careful and safe you play.  Injuries sometimes occur even during simple drills or exercises, not necessarily during the toughest part of training such as sparring.

Pain exists to remind us that what we are doing is not right for our body and we should really listen to our body; training while ignoring pain could be dangerous and deteriorate the injured part with the risk of causing permanent damages.  At the same time there are safe ways of training when injured by using the body parts that don’t hurt so that you keep training them and avoid contact with the injured part.

An extreme case of this behaviour is Alex who recently broke a bone in hit foot by slipping while sparring; although with the foot in a hard cast he kept attending our classes doing stretching, press ups and abdominal exercises so to keep up with fitness and flexibility.  At some point as you can see in this video below he was even punching the bag while seated.

In over 30 years of training I was lucky enough to avoid any seriously broken bones (apart from a little toe a couple of years ago) but every time I bruised, mildly dislocated joints or strained muscles on one side of my body I kept training with the other side improving the total symmetry of my techniques.

Change of venue from November 16th 2010

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From November 16th 2010 all Tuesday and Thursday training sessions will change location to the Fenners Gallery, Kelsey Kerridge.

Those who train on Sundays will be familiar with the Fenners Gallery as the winter-time and “bad weather” venue for Sunday training. For those not familiar with the Fenners Gallery, it can be found on the floor above the reception area.

The Fenners Gallery is considerably larger and better ventilated than the two rooms we presently use, and is equipped with full-length mirrors along one wall, which are useful for solo technique training.

Rain? No problem!

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So far we have been lucky this summer: as usual all Sundays of July and August we (try to) train outdoor.  Historically we managed to get about 5-6 out of 8-9 Sundays in any given year.  Summer 2010 has been good and we managed to get all Sundays outdoor this year.

Yesterday lesson was no different if not that at about 6 o’clock it started raining.  It was obviously too late traying relocating the lesson and, at the same time, the 9 CARISMA members at the lesson seemed so focussed on their training that they carried on kicking each other; luckily within less that 10 few minutes it stopped.  See them in this clip as they are training while rain is pooring down:

Toward the end of the lesson the sun came out so the lesson completed with and nice and relaxing conditioning training 🙂 of which you can see a simple example from Heley and Aaron:

Summer Camp 2009 – the video

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With apologies from our video production company we can finally proudly announce the official video of the Summer Camp 2009 and, in this weather, remember the great time we had last summer in both terms of training and fun.  Looking forward to Summer Camp 2010!

Here is the video:

Summer Camp 2009

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Copyright 2009 Linda Silvestri

Copyright 2009 Linda Silvestri

Get a bunch of great people, passionate about martial arts, put them in a pleasant location of the Hungarian country side and get them to train martial arts for 13 hours over a period of 5 days (some of them 19 hours in 7 days), in temperatures ranging between 25 and 32 degrees Celsius. Blend in some great activities like see sighting, thermal SPA, wine tasting and eating most meals in a good restaurant and, no doubt, you get a successful Summer Camp.

Main purposes for the Summer Camp, now at its fifth edition, is having a great holiday in an unusual location and at the same time enjoy an important amount of highly focussed training hours. This allows all participants to learn new things, practice and correct mistakes about their own techniques and have great fun in the process. All sessions were outdoors, on grass, in the shade offered by some nice trees.

Day 1 – Friday – Cambridge to Csokonyavisonta (via Budapest)

Copyright 2009 Massimo Gaetani

Copyright 2009 Massimo Gaetani

While 7 people flew in from Luton one was on a train from Cambridge across Europe and another one by train from Munich.  They all met at Budapest airport, rented a total of three cars and drove to Csokonyavisonta, arriving at about 6 P.M.

Soon after their arrival all participants were allocated to their accommodations: within half an hour the first session started, at 6:30PM. Given the short time before closure of the only decent restaurant in the village we decided to train just for an hour practising a few Wing Chun drills.  I run the overall lesson, technically helped by Andrea that is an expert of Wing Chun.

Dinner at the local Korona Etterem (restaurant) and an early sleep was due: just a few welcoming drinks at the house and meeting arranged for the following day at 9AM, ready to start.

Day 2 – Saturday

Copyright 2009 James Weatherall

Copyright 2009 James Weatherall

While warming up I checked with the various participants what topic they were mostly interested in covering during the next 4 session, lasting 3 hours each. Here is the list of topics to focus on:

  • Boxing (2)
  • Close range fighting
  • Hook punches (2)
  • Hook kicks
  • Sparring in a competitive way, e.g. mini tounament (4)
  • Foot work (2)
  • Body movement, weight shifting and balance
  • Training in pairs with unexpected attacks
  • Axe kicks
  • Combinations with several changes of guard
  • Basics (2)
  • Special combinations

Having a total of four instructors, with 2 black, 1 brown and 1 blue belt, in a group of ten people surely added great value to the whole camp and people with lower rank truly appreciated the level of attention they received throughout the whole Summer Camp.

The Saturday session covered the following topics, more or less in this order:

Boxing: close range jab-cross vs. hook-hook; passive defence vs. attack; we then added kicks, one person attacking with kicks and punches and the other just punching.  This was forcing the person using reduced set of techniques to force himself/herself to work hard on guard, footwork, evasive moves and so on.

We then did some sparring alternating half and full speed, light contact both hands only and complete kickboxing.

Copyright 2009 Georgios Evangelinos

Copyright 2009 Georgios Evangelinos

For the afternoon we agreed to visit Villany a famous wine district where we had some wine tasting and nibbles.  On the way back we had dinner in Pécs a nice city well known to everybody who has been to CARISMA summer camps.

Day 3 – Sunday

We started with combinations that require change of guard and stance several times: these are excellent and both improve guard and foot work.  This kind of training draws attention to the importance of finishing each technique in a way that allows the next one to start properly, optimizing the whole sequence and reducing extra foot work and time wasting.

Some of the combinations practiced were:

  • Front kick f.l. followed by round kick r.l. and then round kick with the same leg (f.l.)
  • Front kick f.l. followed by round kick r.l. and then side kick with the same leg (f.l.)
  • Uppercut f.a. – Uppercut r.a. – Hook punch f.a.  followed by round kick f.l.
  • Cross – Hook punch f.a. – spinning back side kick followed by jab-cross-hook

For the second part of the session we organised a small light contact competition where one pair of fighters at a time was competing with 1 central referee and 3 external judges.

We then had a few session of co-operative sparring where alternating each opponent had the opportunity of putting together a combination of 2 to 5-6 strikes.

We concluded this session with half an hour of Multicombat combinations in the midday sun: this was a nice gesture of mine to remind people to be on time for the following sessions 🙂  We finally cooled down.

Copyright 2009 James Weatherall

Copyright 2009 James Weatherall

We spent the rest of the day chilling out (swimming, thermal baths, playing chess) in the same thermal SPA and pool resort where we were training.  Later that day we had a few hours walk (as we did not do enough sport that day) in a beautiful forest nearby and then dinner in a local restaurant.

Day 4 – Monday

After warming up good part of this session was taken up by power work: the importance of proper alignment of body and limbs in order to deliver maximum power at all times was emphasized several times during this exercise.  We worked primarily at techniques like:

  • Jab
  • Cross
  • Round kick front and rear leg
  • Front kick front and rear leg
  • combinations of the above

We then experimented on a visualization technique: analysing in detail, while sitting and breathing slowly, a combination in order to rehearse in our mind and then practice it to test if the visualization helped the performance.

We spent the remaining half hour on technical issues involving axe kicks, the subtleties involved in their proper execution and how to optimise them and the we cooled down.

goulash

Copyright 2009 Linda Silvestri

Plan for the afternoon for a nice, traditional goulash that was prepared thanks to a perfectly co-ordinated team work.  While a few people started to prepare a cold lunch based on bread, cured meats, cheese and fresh vegetables the others started cutting and chopping the various ingredients: the actual cooking phase of the goulash, in a traditional cauldron over the open fire, started at around 3:30PM. The cooking time, in excess of 5 hours was to be spent relaxing, chatting having a drink and with Adam playing his guitar. The result managed to exceed expectations.

Day 5 – Tuesday

6 of the participants to the summer camp were living soon after this session that consisted of:

  • Pushing around and basics of street fighting engagement.
  • Combinations that involved sliding while performing double kicks with the same leg.  More emphasis on sliding and its implications.
  • We then run a number of rounds of sparring.

We then spent the afternoon visiting Orfü a beautiful hill nearby Pécs full of natural ponds, big enough to have proper beaches and many people swimming around.

Day 6 – Wednesday

Being the last full day we decided to have an easy day (after training, the session was as hard as the others). Training was organized at the Barcs SPA complex, 15 Km from Csokonyavisonta with the intention to spend there a good part of the day.

The session involved: hook kick clinique.  Starting from the basics of the movement from lying position we evolved the training into standing while holding onto an object and then applying the technique to a target hitting from the front leg.

We then moved into hook punch clinique: after a short overview of the technique and its applications from both the front and rear arm we passed to applications that always use double hook punches with the front arm.

We then spent the remaining half hour of the session working on very basic concepts of knife defence and fighting.

The rest of the day was spent chilling out in the spa complex, swimming in the pools, and enjoying the sauna and the large Jacuzzi.

Day 7 – Thursday

Copyright 2009 Massimo Gaetani

Copyright 2009 Massimo Gaetani

This was the conclusive session of the camp for this year: we wrapped up some of the concepts explained in the previous sessions and then did more work on boxing in passive defence to develop easy approach to accept punching attacks and reduce the tension usually induced.

More work on hook kicks from rear leg, front leg and spinning back.

We finished with some basic moves of Wing Chun.

Conclusions

Once more this summer camp was a great success.  I list below the reasons that I see as the most relevant ones to consider participating to the next Summer Camp:

  • all participants get to do lot of highly focussed training (this year 13 hours for who stayed 5 days and 19 hours for the others): they get to work of what they would like to improve and receive a great level of attention to help correcting mistakes and improving performance;
  • for some people it’s noticeable the improvement of a particular technique that perhaps was never as good as it could get and it was corrected during the Summer Camp;
  • it gives me the possibility of getting interesting feed back, from different people at different levels of their martial arts experience, about how to keep improving the way we run the club and our classes;
  • it helps the various people at the Summer Camp to bond beyond the usual “hi-train-goodbye” pattern that some people follow and develop interesting personal and friendly relationships with some other members of the club;
  • at its 5th edition the Summer Camp has now a tradition with a few people who were there most of the times, a few people that have been a 1-2 times and a few first timers: this offers continuity and diversity at the same time;

The first and second year’s Summer Camp were still to be considered one-off events; the Summer Camp is now a tradition to continue for the years to come.  I personally missed all people that have been at the Summer Camp before and could not make it this year but I would like to mention Duncan who could not be with us due to family issues: apart from his highly appreciated expertise as a martial artist and instructor we obviously missed the top quality of the pictures that he usually takes.  I’ll be working on the official video for the Summer Camp 2009 that will be released as soon as technically possible.

Apart from myself participants to the summer camp were: Adam, Andrea, Chris, Georgios, Heley, Linda, Mark, Ronnit and Wez.  I would like to thank them all for the great work and commitment in the training and fun activities that once more made me enjoy it so much and inspired me to organise the Summer Camp 2010.

I would appreciate comments to this post from people thatwere there and from those that missed it: thank you in advance.