How Often Should You Practice Karate

How often should you practice karate?

The exact question i get asked a lot, is ‘how often should i train?‘

The last person who asked me wanted to do everything correctly, but wanted the fastest way to black belt.

There are several variables involved as to when someone will reach black belt in karate.

Attitude being the main one!

Let me give you a classic example where attitude is concerned.

Lets say there are two karateka, equally matched.

They are both as fit as eachother, as flexible as eachother, same speed, same strength, height, weight, thoughts, etc.

You get the idea. They are two of the same person and on their way to black belt.

But we are going to change one variable, attitude!

karateka 2, we will give a really positive, strong attitude, the other (karateka 1) not so strong.

Because we having given one karateka a disadvantage, we will also give the other a disadvantage.

Karateka 1 can practice karate five times per week, but karateka 2 can only practice karate once per week.

This will throw the question below back onto every person who asks 🙂

How Often Should You Practice Karate

I have been teaching for over 40 years and I have seen this time and time again.

The karateka training once per week will be as good as the karateka training 5 times per week!

There! I said it 🙂

At one of our Dojo kata competitions, we had this exact scenario.

I had a parent come to me and say, ‘my son trains three times per week and they only train once, how could he possibly beat my son?’

You probably can guess what I wanted to say 🙂 But I refrained and was very diplomatic.

I wanted to say ~

‘He might train three times per week, but most of the time he’s thinking about his XBox.

While the other boy only trains once per week, but is 100% focused and trains like his life depends on it’

There are some other variables regarding how often you should practice karate.

You Must Enjoy Karate

Believe it or not, there are people practicing karate who do not really enjoy it.

If you do not enjoy karate, don’t do it!

Life is too short, you must enjoy life and only practice karate if you truly love it!

Now, when you first start offline or online karate classes, it may take a month for you to know if it’s a good fit or not.

But ultimately, you must enjoy Karate.

Your Karate Should Flow!

The amount of robotic karateka out there is astounding!

You see them, they force everything in the belief that they are doing strong karate with really good kime (focus).

Your karate should flow like water, yes kime at the completion of a technique, but not for the entire karate class 🙂

Conclusion

How often should you practice karate?

So in conclusion, if you have these three ingrediants you are going to get to black belt and beyond very quickly!

They are ~

  1. Attitude ~ Strong, positive, never give up attitude.
  2. Enjoy ~ You must enjoy your karate.
  3. Flow ~ No Robbie Robots allowed 🙂

But i will leave the last word to the legendary baseball player, Babe Ruth, he says it all in a few words!

Oss! (there is also a very short video below the famous quote)

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About the author

I have been practicing and teaching karate for over 50 years and believe first and foremost, karateka should enjoy their karate. There is nothing better than seeing a person develop into a great martial artist through their karate practice, while at the same time really enjoying karate.

Linden Huckle 7th Dan