White Belt with one stripe (9th kyu)
After your first grading, you will progress to 9th kyu. At this grade you will have a piece of black tape on the tip of your white belt. This symbolises your progress as a beginner at karate. At 9th kyu, you are still working on developing an entry level understanding of the basic stances, punches, kicks, and blocks that are used in karate. The training syllabus for a 9th kyu is as follows:
Basics (Kihon)
Zenkutsu Dachi, Gedan Barai (front stance, low sweeping block)
- Chudan jun tsuki (punch to solar plexus).
- Chudan gyaku tsuki (reverse punch to solar plexus).
- Jodan age uke (upwards, face-level block).
- Chudan soto uke (outside block at midsection-level).
- Chudan uchi uke (inside block at midsection-level).
Note: All should be done stepping forward and backward.
Kokutsu Dachi, Shuto Uke (back stance, knife hand block)
- Chudan shuto uke (forward and backward, knife hand block).
Note: Should be done stepping forward and backward.
Zenkutsu Dachi, Kamae (front stance, hands to the side
- Mae geri (front snap kick).
Kiba Dachi (horse riding stance)
- Yoko geri keage (side snap kick to the chin using dorsel/instep part of foot).
Kata
Fighting techniques (Kumite)
Note: At this level you must also be able to demonstrate gohon kumite using mae geri (attack) and gedan bari (defence).
The minimum training time before your attempting a grading to 8th kyu is 3 months with a minimum of 36 hours of class time.
