A Tuesday night class at Ligo Dojo.
Congratulations to Greg, Lucas, Brian, Sam, Howard and Curtis for getting their first color belts!

A Blast from the Past!

Congratulations to Curtis Bennett who recently moved from California and joined Ligo Dojo. Curtis was a Budo Karate House residential student for just over one hundred days almost three years ago. All residential students in the BKH program promise on their honor to complete 1000 days of uninterrupted training and Curtis, three years ago, was unable to fulfill this promise. We at BKH however are extremely impressed by his courage and desire to succeed for his moving back to North Carolina with his fiancé and new college degree (Physical Therapist's Assistant) in order to resume his training as a member of Ligo Dojo and we welcome him with open arms!

January '06, Ligo Dojo

"I trained in other dojos in California including a Kyokushin dojo," he explained, "but none of them were as tough as what I experienced when I was here in the BKH dormitory."

Curtis aspires to be Ligo Dojo's first nonresidential student to participate in tournaments in Japan. (Below, see photos of Curtis in the BKH dormitory three years ago.) We remember him as being somewhat of a hard case: He liked to do things his own way but, in the BKH dormitory, there's only the BKH dormitory way. It's hard to believe that this young man who showed up at Ligo Dojo this December was the same guy. He showed up and behaved in exactly the way one would expect of a future champion: Remembering all the Japanese-dojo etiquette that he used while a residential student, he immediately fussed up to his being unable to make it before but went on to explain like an matured adult that he hadn't been able to find this type of training anywhere else, and asked for permission to become a regular dojo student.

Curtis is second from left (above) during a morning training session with other earlier BKH residents (2003) and (below, right) having dinner that we cooked for Shihan Jacques and his wife, Annie, at their home in New York City on a trip there for a competition.

An earlier residential student who completed a full year in the dormitory, Ted Gohman of Florida (below), is finishing 4 years in the US Marine Corps this February, and he wrote to BKH as recently as November to reaffirm HIS desire to reenter the BKH dormitory once he gets out. No disrespect to the USMC, of course, but "boot camp was nothing compared to being in the BKH dormitory," he wrote. Ted hopes to have his own dojo after completing two more years in the dormitory. Personally, it's hard for us to imagine anyone getting out of 4 years in the Marine Corps then wanting to go back to the kind of boot camp that BKH has to offer, so we'll see if he actually makes it back! Because his attitude is so great, we'll welcome him too with open arms. That's him bag training (left) and roughing up with his Sempai (right) in 2001.

Robert Schnoes (below), 130 days and counting in the BKH dormitory. Let's see how HE fairs for the next 100 days before his next tournament in Japan. Congratulations to Paul Pearce who is due to begin his 1000 days of training by entering the BKH dormitory in February!

A Ligo Dojo student training hand in hand with a BKH residential student.

Click here for results of a local toughman competition
in which Schnoes and Curtis participated.