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December 2012
Chief International Coach of the WCA, Iain Abernethy, recently discussed the importance of simulation training in his podcast at the end of November. At the end of the podcast Coach John Titchen was recommended as one of the leading pioneers in this field in the UK. You can listen to the podcast, which also discusses training with injuries and a number of other issues here. To find out more about the simulation training run by Coach John Titchen and see some students from other styles experiencing it, visit the DART youtube channel.


October 05 2012
Today I've uploaded a short video clip of me demonstrating an application of Shuto Uke. This can be viewed on the DART youtube channel!

August 27 2012
Today I've uploaded an interview conducted by Michael Rosenbaum:

John Titchen Interview by Michael Rosenbaum

May 1 2012
Today I've uploaded another excellent article by Bill Burgar:

Putting Kata back at the heart of Karate - Part Thirteen: The Entertainers

May 1 2012
Today I've uploaded another excellent chapter of Michael Rosenbaum's book:

Comprehensive Karate - from Beginner to Black Belt: Chapter Eight: Transcendence of Kata

April 28 2012
Today I've uploaded an excellent article by Bill Burgar on Phase Space:

Putting Kata back at the heart of Karate - Part Twelve: Phase Space

October 18 2011
Today I've uploaded an excellent article by Iain Abernethy on the usefulness of MMA for TMA practitioners:

What TMA can learn from MMA

October 17 2011
Today I've uploaded another excellent chapter of Michael Rosenbaum's book:

Comprehensive Karate - from Beginner to Black Belt: Chapter Seven: The soul of Karate: Kata

October 8 2011
Today I've uploaded another excellent article by Bill Burgar:

Putting Kata back at the heart of Karate - Part Eleven: Kata Analysis for the Phases of Combat

October 1 2011
Sorry for the long delay! Today I've uploaded an excellent article by Bill Burgar:

Putting Kata back at the heart of Karate - Part Ten: Phases of Combat

August 20 2011
Today I've uploaded an excellent new article by Michael Rosenbaum:

Ground Grappling on the Battlefield and in the Arena

August 20 2011
Today I've uploaded another article in the series by Bill Burgar:

Putting Kata back at the heart of Karate - Part Nine: Kata breakdown by the Reverse HAOV Method

August 8 2011
Today I've uploaded a brand new article outlining my thoughts on broad approaches to personal kata training:

Personal Kata Training - taking the red pill

August 7 2011
Today I've uploaded an article on Habitual Acts of Violence by Bill Burgar:

Putting Kata back at the heart of Karate - Part Eight: Habitual Acts of Violence

June 28 2011
Today I've uploaded an article on grappling and throwing in Karate which I've previously only posted on Iain Abernethy's forum:

Karate Grappling and Throwing

June 18 2011
Today I've uploaded three interesting articles by Iain Abernethy:

The magnitude of Kata

A brief history of Kata

The Bubishi - Karate's most important text?

June 17 2011
Today I've uploaded Chapter Six of Michael Rosenbaum's book.

Comprehensive Karate - from Beginner to Black Belt: Chapter Six: Lost in translation, the post war styles

June 10 2011
Today I've uploaded another excellent article by Rakesh Patel.

Combat Kata - A Kata Evolution

June 7 2011
Today I've uploaded a new article of mine on Scenario Training in Reality Based Self Defence.

Reality Based Self Defence: Scenario Building

June 3 2011
Today I've uploaded an old article of mine, taken from the Heian Flow System.

Combat Magazine October 2007 Heian/Pinan - Origin and Originator

June 1 2011
Today I've uploaded Chapter Five of Michael Rosenbaum's book. It contains an excellent overview of the different prominent late nineteenth and early twentieth century Karate teachers.

Comprehensive Karate - from Beginner to Black Belt: Chapter Five: One art divided by different personalities

May 30 2011
It's been a busy time. The Heian Flow System seminar at Barr Beacon in Walsall was well received, an excellent group of Karateka. In addition the Blade Awareness seminar near Nottingham was appreciated by those who attended, finding both the safety briefing and the contact simulations to be eye opening.
I've also attended two seminars with Rick Clark as part of his UK tour. Even for those people that are not interested in pressure point striking there's plenty to be learned, especially with regard to small circle joint controls - which by extension give you greater insight into the application of more gross motor controlling techniques. Rick has been selling copies of a DVD of his Nagare No Kata - a Kata designed to teach principles of applying and transferring between different controlling techniques.
Today I've uploaded two more articles in the series by Bill Burgar to the Practical Karate articles hub. I had the pleasure of chatting with Bill on Tuesday evening, and acting as Uke for him while he demonstrated some of his applications of Gojushiho and talked about creating visual and tactile memories for solo Kata practise.

Putting Kata back at the heart of Karate - Part Six: Karate's changes through history

Putting Kata back at the heart of Karate - Part Seven: Learning the lessons of Kata

May 13 2011
Three more articles uploaded to the Practical Karate articles hub. An article by a 'new' author, Rakesh Patel, whose contribution is very welcome, and another in the series by Bill Burgar. I've also added an article I wrote in 2007 on Aliveness in Kata with a short embedded video clip from the same time.

Combat Kata - A duality of theme

Putting Kata back at the heart of Karate - Part Five: Kata, the visualisation tool

Aliveness in Kata

April 29 2011
To celebrate the bank holiday I've uploaded three more articles to the Practical Karate articles hub. Two great articles by Iain Abernethy and a continuation in the series by Bill Burgar:

Putting Kata back at the heart of Karate - Part Four: Practise vs Performance

The "Missing Links" of Kata?

Naihanchi - Karate's most deadly Kata?

April 23 2011
An early easter or St George's day gift, I've uploaded two more excellent chapters by Michael Rosenbaum:

Comprehensive Karate - from Beginner to Black Belt: Chapter Three: Tode - Forefather of Modern Karate

Comprehensive Karate - from Beginner to Black Belt: Chapter Four: The Empty Hand Art

April 18 2011
Today I've uploaded a thought provoking article by Bill Burgar:

Putting Kata back at the heart of Karate - Part Three: Rules

April 16 2011
Practical Karate has two new contributing authors! Michael Rosenbaum, author of the acclaimed book Kata and the Transmission of Knowledge: In Traditional Martial Arts has passed some exciting articles on to me for publication. Matthew Donoghue, global moderator for the Martial Arts Planet forum has also provided a great piece on the transition from being a Kyu grade to a Dan grade. To see the new articles visit the articles page.
Coach John Titchen will be teaching a Heian Flow System seminar at the Barr Beacon Leisure Centre on 15 May. Places are limited so to find out more and to contact the organiser to book your place visit the facebook page for the event here.
Coach John Titchen will be teaching a Blade Awareness seminar in Southwell on 21 May. Places are limited so to find out more and to book a place contact the organiser via facebook here.


March 28 2011
Practical Karate has a new contributing author! Bill Burgar, author of the acclaimed book Five Years: One Kata has passed some exciting articles on to me for publication. Today I've uploaded two thought provoking articles:

Putting Kata back at the heart of Karate - Part One: Context

Putting Kata back at the heart of Karate - Part Two: Objectives

In addition to posting meesages here I'll also be keeping people updated on changes to the site at our facebook page.
March 27 2011
Practical Karate is on facebook! This is an excellent place for you to post your Practical Karate photos and videos of training. To kick off the trend an old video of John Titchen demonstrating part of the Heian Flow System has been posted for your viewing pleasure.
March 25 2011
New articles posted on Practical Karate!
Today I've uploaded two more articles by Karate author Iain Abernethy:

Karate on the Ground

No first attack in Karate?

Thanks to everyone for the messages of support I've had for the new website. I'm pleased to announce that another well known Karate writer has agreed to submit many of his old articles which are no longer available. I'll keep you posted when these arrive!
February 2011
Welcome to the new site!

I've had an idea for this site for a long time. It's been half a decade since my first Karate articles were published, and I wanted to be able to put them all together for people outside the UK to read. The added bonus is that I'm privileged that two distinguished martial artists, Rick Clark and Iain Abernethy, have agreed to let me host their articles here as well to add to the depth of information on offer. I've currently put several articles from each of thee authors up on the site and I'll mention new additions here as they occur.