John Holdsworth 6th Dan

John Holdsworth 6th Dan, born on the 1st August 1947 in Sunderland has been training in Karate for 55 years. John started training in January 1966 at the Sunderland Shotokan Karate Club. His reason for starting Karate was that he was constantly bullied at school as he was quite small and did not fully grow until after he left school.

The Club at Sunderland was being taught by a 2nd Dan Judo practitioner mostly from a book by Sensei Nishiyama. The club had graded previously and the highest grades were three 8th Kyu’s. The first grading was by sensei Kanazawa and John jumped to 7th Kyu and the current 8th Kyu’s graded to 7th Kyu. Shortly after the Judo instructor left the club which left John and the other three 7th Kyu’s the highest grades and they shared the instruction between them. John has been teaching ever since.

Grading’s at this time were difficult due to a lack of instructors who only visited the club between four and six months. There were a number of difficulties over the early years as a result of the limited instruction available and John has learnt a Kata on a Saturday and used it at a grading the next day on more than one occasion.

John passed his first Dan with Sensei  Enoeda at the Newcastle YMCA on the 15th August 1971. Before taking his 1st Dan grade John had never seen a Dan grading, had never been informed what to do on the grading, and had never seen any grading syllabus which made things a little difficult.

He established the Sendai Karate Club in Sunderland in 1969 at the Y.M.C.A. which later moved to the Crowtree Leisure Centre in Sunderland. John’s tournament success includes 35 1st places, in Kata, Kumite and Team events and over 35 top four placings in various Shotokan and all style events.

He was previously a Senior Instructor with the KUGB, a Grading Examiner, a KUGB Assessor for instructors qualifications and Referee and regularly instructs at clubs throughout the country.

John and his wife Julie Nicholson run the Ronin Karate Club in Washington in the North East of England. John’s main interests are coaching and studying coaching methods and principals, and currently coaches a number of individuals, and with his wife has attended numerous National Coaching Foundation courses. He has lectured and written articles for magazines on a variety of subjects such as nutrition, mental preparation, coaching children, error correction, periodization and peak performance.

In 1999 he guided his wife, Julie Nicholson, to achieve her dream which was to be the first woman to win the Double at the Shotokan Cup and repeated the same in 2001 at the KUGB National Championships and become the first Grand Champion, in winning both the Individual Kata and Kumite events. Johns senior students have achieved numerous national and international honours including 2 World Kata titles, 2 European Kumite titles, 3 European Kata titles, 5 Nakayama Cup Kata titles, 5 National Team Kumite titles, 5 National Team Kata titles 16 National Kata titles, 15 Shotokan Cup Kata titles, 3 Shotokan Cup Kumite tiles, 3 National Kumite titles and numerous national titles at Junior level.

John’s firm belief is that quality training is the most important and all techniques should be studied in depth to ensure they are executed correctly. Repeated practice does not make things perfect, it makes things permanent. Only perfect “quality” practice makes perfect. Simply repeating techniques that are incorrect ingrains bad habits and should be avoided.