'Wise Warrior' Cheltenham UK

[tmorterlaing]

Sounds familiar. Must be something about Karate that attracts that kind of thing...

Attracts what kind of thing?

[StraightUpMA]

The McDojo kind of thing. It was a flippant comment, don't worry.

[Gladitsnite]

Hi, my 1st post.
I am the person who wrote about my visit to 'Wisewarrior' quoted in StraightupMA's post. In fact they trade under 2 names, Wisewarrior and Cheltenham Sword and Aikido, when questioned they do admit to being part of BAMA.
I rang one of the instructors before visiting to clarify what I was interested in before visiting the Sword and Aikido school. while waiting for the instructors to turn up I spoke to one of the students, he had been training for 12 months and was a dan grade in the BAMA karate. He was unable to tell me of any Aikido exercises, I asked about Ikkyo, Kokyu Nage etc, all questions were politely met with 'sorry I don't know what your talking about.'
When the instructor arrived I questioned him about the Aikido style and its provenance. This was met by 'We teach the principles of Aikido.'
The two hour class was split into two parts; 1st hour Aikido (???) and 2nd hour sword. There were no mats on the floor and in the 'Aikido' hour no exercises/techniques were taught. In an exercise (closest resemblance mune dori) while practicing with a young female the instructor accused me of not pushing (attacking) with sufficient force or in the right way. I apologised and stated that I was doing the best that I could (with respect for the slightly built young lady and my 20+ years of Aikido experience). When I did add a little gusto it was apparent that the young lady could not cope with this and the instructor took her place.
This became more interesting in that he seemed not to understand the nature of Aikido attacks (what he was teaching was in essence a karate style block/parry to a push) and it became even more interesting when he asked me to 'do' some locks. I told him that I didn't know any and he then asked me to do something that I did know - so I demonstrated nikkyo.....
At the break/changeover I decided to thank them for their time and leave. I was not charged for the session and I had seen enough not to continue to the 'sword' lesson.
To clarify things somewhat I will state that I hold a 4th Dan in Aikido from 2004 given to me by Ken Williams Sensei - the 1st assistant to a Japanese instructor in England (Kenshiro Abbe Sensei).
At the end of the Aikido session I explained to the instructor my feelings about what he was teaching and asked directly whether this was in fact the 'Aikido-te' invented by Pete Delane of BAMA. He stated that it was and that it was a style for modern self defence - I stated that it was not Aikido and bore no resemblance to this.
I reported the organisation to Trading Standards as misrepresenting what they are selling/teaching/advertising.
I have no problem with anyone saying this is what I have developed if they can tell me why and how it works better/differently to what they started with.
From reading their web blogs it is clear that they have gradings in Aikido but without knowing any of the traditional Japanese exercises I am a loss to understand how this works.
They are part of BAMA - as a franchise and attempt to get people to train in the other aspects of budo, which then involves BAMA gradings (evident from their web blogs).
StraightupMA talked about BAMA advertising Pete Delane as holding 3rd dan in Karate and 5th dan in weapons. He had a 2nd dan in Zen Shin Ryu karate (Jon Alexander) and no grade in weapons - how do I know this - simple, I trained with him at the time.

[It is Fake]

Thank you. If this would have been used to start the thread, there would be zero problems now.

[StraightUpMA]

My bad, I wasn't completely aware of how much evidence you were after to start a thread. I was under the impression that starting a thread would start the hunt for evidence. And it kinda did in the end... :)

[It is Fake]

Oh this is not evidence, but he admits he trained, explained his rank, explains the connection, went for a visit and isn't calling them frauds.

There still needs to be more connections shown, but this is the proper start.

[StraightUpMA]

Have we established then that they're part of the BAMA? If so, I can answer the questions from first hand experience, having trained with them for a number of years.

[Diesel_tke]

Have we established then that they're part of the BAMA? If so, I can answer the questions from first hand experience, having trained with them for a number of years.

Yes, but you are answering questions about BAMA, correct? And isn't there a thread about BAMA?

Just being clear that this thread was started about "Wise Warrior". Your views of BAMA are definately relevent to BAMA, if you have experience with them.

I appreciate Gladitsnite's post for the relevance to "Wise Warrior".

[It is Fake]

Here is an example.

My old school is a Mcdojo with Bullshido involved. I'd even argue there was some extreme cult **** in their teachings. One of the schools broke off, still teaches some things, but has started bringing in legit teachers. He was, including the majority of his training, given questionable rank.

It isn't right, until you prove direct connections, to say he is still the same and guilty of the same BS. Now, warning/showing people is one thing. Calling them cultists, frauds and crappy is another.

[bushy2812]

First post and just thought I may be able to contribute. For clarity I used to train with Bushido for years, for the first few years under one of the main instructors of Wise Warrior who features in most of the pictures.

Not sure how I can evidence some of this but someone else may be able to. the Wise Warrior website has been changed over the last few months as information started to come out in other forums. In the first version they clearly stated they were part of the BAMA in small print at the bottom of one of the pages. That has now been removed so I probably can't provide evidence other than what I witnessed. For those who don't know BAMA is the 'World Governing Body' setup by Pete Delane with only Bushido Karate under its fold.

Secondly the badges have been removed from the photos in the main body of the website. There was some evidence circulating on another forum that they had been photoshopped out as the exact same photos existed elsewhere on other sites with clearly visible Bushido / Delane Academy badges. Those badges are still evident in the photos on the top right of the website that rotate and they are definately from the aforementioned school. If you look carefully those badges are still evident on photos on the blog section from as recent as 7th April.

Confirmation of their membership is actually available on the blog section of their own site where they state "A reminder to you all, that the next national BAMA gradings are now only 10 weeks away. ". This surely is concrete evidence that they are not a break away but very much part of the BAMA which is solely governed by Delane. It also confirms that students are studying for Bushido Karate and Aikido-Te grades. I don't need to rehash the problems with that as it is very clear from this very site amongst others.

Another extract from their blog from February states "A new strengthening of dojo etiquette this week regarding the formality of the start and end of lessons, and the understanding of the grades in the dojo.". So they are selling throughout as relaxed and informal and now start to change it once students have joined. That formality and 'etiquette' were the building blocks of the BAMA, and having been an instructor there that is the thing that is drummed into you that you need to get into your students before anything else, and it is critical to their progression. Is this an example of bait and switch? I don't know but the question should be asked.

Another extract from their blog states "Finally well done to all those who took the hint from Richard san and Tim San and turned up to the Tuesday night class, without going in to details here I’m sure you will agree it was an amazing night, we were lucky to have the visit and learn so much from this ‘guest’!". I will state now that I have no evidence of this, but from years spent in the BAMA this is exactly how visits from Delane were referred to. I will leave it at that.

Nothing concrete in there and take it or leave it but those are just my observations of the things they have placed in the public domain.