Kenpo Karate

Martial arts have now remained to be one of the best activities which people tend to indulge with. When you look at the large population of people in this earth, you will realize that most of them are in one way or another involved in different types of martial arts discipline. One of the most common and widely practiced by people all around the world is Kenpo Karate. In the following paragraphs, we will know where it came from and how it differs from an other forms of karate or martial arts so to say.

Kenpo Karate was also once known as "Ed Parker system" in America. The reason behind this is that many Kenpo instructors were trained directly under the said famous martial artist. But this does not mean that Parker was the founder of Kenp Karate. Actually, it was introduced by Parker's own instructor named Professor William (Willie) K. S. Chow, who began calling his system "Kenpo Karate" in 1949. Chow in turn was trained in "Kenpo Jiu-Jitsu" under Great Grand Master James Mitose who had learned the Kenpo art in Japan from his grandfather Sakuhi Yoshida.

Kenpo karate may sometimes be called as Kempo but actually there is no difference between the two. Kenpo Karate is a distinct form of Kenpo. The techniques involved in this discipline are virtually identical from Mistsoe's Kenpo Jui-Jitsu. The difference is mostly observed in their Katas. There were no Katas in Chow's Kenpo Karate while Kenpo Jiu-Jitsu has 4 Katas, Nihanchi 1 & 2, the Bear Kata and Old Man Kata.

In Japanese martial arts however, kenpo is used to allocate Chinese martial arts (this is similar to the term kung fu which is used in English-speaking countries), some koryu jujutsu styles as well as several gendai budo such as Shorinji Kempo and Nippon Kempo. The "m" instead of "n" is often used when describing such discipline in a Japanese usage so as to avoid confusion with the similar terms used in Japanese government.

When Ed Parker began teaching, he only organized three belts: white, brown and black. Later on, he added brown tabs on the white belts to show the sign of progress to brown belt. Black tabs are also added on brown belts to assign improvement toward the black belt rank.

As time went by, another belt ranking system was developed by the Tracy brothers who were former students of Parker. They developed "colored belt system." In this system, the basic colours consist of White, Yellow, Orange, Purple, Blue, Green, Third Kyu Brown, Second Kyu Brown, First Kyu Brown, and First through Tenth Black. However, different organizations of Kenpo karate especially in America have their own different belt systems. This is for exemplified by the WKKA (World Kenpo Karate Association) where they include an "advanced" rank for each belt signified by a stripe of the next full belt's color worn on one end of the belt. It also has a 3 degree Red belt prior to first degree black.

Like any other type of martial arts, Kempo Karate requires discipline, loyalty and most of all- determination.