First of all, I wish to congratulate Mr. Tim Shafer on his successful promotion to the rank of Yondan, fourth degree black belt. The test was held in Estes Park, Colorado this past weekend. Yondans Thompson, Vinciguerra, Bushue, & Wilkewitz were in attendance. We were very honored to have Yondan Bushue from the Storm Dragon leg participate in the retreat. Yondan Shafer begin his study of our Art in 1985 at the age of 15. He is an expert in healing arts as well as an accomplished martial artist. Congratulations Yondan!

The Boulder School of Self Defense (BSSD) is no more. We have a new name - The Boulder Karate Club (BKC). The new website is www.boulderkarate.org. Thanks to Sumanth for his hard work on the website.

The BKC also has a new purple belt. Deb Coby-Miller passed her test in February to become the school's second purple belt. Congrats Deb! Deb and purple belt Mark Cohen also completed DART's Lead Instructor Course late last year. Deb is also working to market DART courses.

In December Master Dusenbery, along with Yondans Thompson, Wilkewitz, and Shaffer, and Shodan Bennetts presented an advanced workshop. They graciously opened a portion of the workshop up to students holding a rank of orange belt or higher for instruction on Qigong, Chi Sao, and sparring techniques. Thank you to Master, Yondans, and Mr. Bennetts!

Students at the BKC have also benefited from the reappearance of Nidan Goter. Mr. Goter has come up from Denver to participate in several classes and to explain his theory of Minimum Effort Karate (MEK).

After each Wednesday evening class students from BKC head to the Rockies Brewery to eat, drink, and watch hockey or basketball on TV. The first pitcher of beer costs a nickel.

Look for a hardcover version of Mark Cohen's mystery, The Fractal Murders, in the bookstores in late April. TFM was a Book Sense Top Ten Mystery in 2002 and has since been purchased by a large publisher. One of the characters in the book holds black belts in karate and aikido.

With the coming of spring, the colors of the world emerge and replace the dull browns, yellows and oranges that come with fall and winter. Our Yonkyus Chad Anonson and Tim Potter are hoping their belt colors will do the opposite as they have entered the chute and are looking to test for their Sankyu ranks in April. Our new Gokyus Zeb Holbrook and Luke Wagner passed their green belt exams just in time for spring. Keeping with the theme, what better way to bring in the spring than with new beginnings and fresh new starts? Chung Fu-do is proud to announce our new dojo facility. Complete with mirrors on the wall, a place to hang pictures of the Masters, and new mats covering our floors complete with our own designated sparring ring. We are hoping that our new dojo will be called home for many walks down the street, and many sparring matches to come. It will be a great facility for our ever changing and growing student base. With another women?s self defense course on the horizon, it looks like Chung Fu-do has officially released fall from its duties and signed on for the spring. (I only hope we?ve missed the snow!)

It has been a busy time for the Dragon Warriors. It was our pleasure to have Yondan Larison's Storm Dragons join us for a Karate Fun Night and Pizza Party. The two classes enjoyed the chance to meet with each other and the opportunity for a little sparring and just general fun. We were also visited by: Grandmaster Landers, Sandan Beccue, and Nidan Petitjean. Everyone seemed to have a good time and they are looking forward to doing it again.

We now have several Yellow belts and a couple of Orange Belts. It is amazing how fast some of our students pick things up. It was always a struggle for us when Dave and I were at their level.

This spring, Kersey Karate Club will celebrate its first anniversary! Everyone, especially myself has grown considerably. Three students that started with the club have a little celebration of their own by passing into the intermediate ranks. Congratulations to Nick, Torrey, and Cassandra for Orange Belt. Students from Yondan Shafer's Okinawan Karate Club participated in the exam; and a good time was had by all. Good Job!

Due to a sudden, unanticipated hike in rent at our meeting place, the Academy has had to curtail operation until a new location can be found.

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The long New England Winter has seen lots of progress for many of our students at the Rose School. We are looking for great things in the next few months from all and will share events as they occur. As most of you know, Grandmaster lost his job in April of 2003 when the company he worked for closed their Burlington, MA offices. The high tech industry in the Rt. 128 belt was decimated in the economic downturn with many workers never being able to recover. Grandmaster perservered and kept hammering away at looking for work using his art everyday to remain strong in the face of adversity. And because of his art and his faith in himself, he was able to make it happen and just began in March 2004 with L.L. Bean in Freeport, ME as a Senior Software Engineer. Unfortunately, Grandmaster's long unemployment took too great of a toll on his marriage and asks for everyone's prayers as he and Pat try to lessen the impact on Colin and Marissa of their decision to separate after 20 years. The Rose School would also like to thank Yondan Tom Thompson of Boulder, CO for his several visits to us as well as other Seacoast clubs over the last month while on short term contract in the Boston area. It has been great to have him visit, and to have our students exposed to some of the great assests of one of our association's most senior members.

Around The Sachem Camp Fire

Hello everyone! I hope you all are in great health and ready for a beautiful and productive Spring!

The Sachem School has been very active during the long and very cold months of Winter. I have had the privilege of sharing my art with students in the Laconia Public School System through Project Extra. This opportunity has allowed me to meet and work with so many fine young adults. It has also expanded the Sachem School class size allowed me to offer Tai Chi to all staff of the the Laconia School System. My deepest gratitude to Shirley Glines, Project Extra Director, for providing this most rewarding opportunity.

In the coming months the Sachem School will be offering Women's Karate and Self-Defense Classes at Plymouth State University, New Beginnings in Laconia and Wonder Women in Boston.

The Sachem School web site is also now on-line. Please visit the site at www.sachemselfdefense.com. My thanks to Emily Cooke for the excellent design and maintenance of the site.

Finally, my congratulations to the following Sachems who received promotions:

• Robbie Leonardo - Rokokyu/Shichikyu
• Stephen Clavette - Shichikyu
• Logan Derepentigny - Shichkyu
• Dave Candeias - Shichikyu

Well the Shadow Dragon Budo Guild is finally taking off in our new location ( In the basement of our new house ) .. Just have one student right now, I am proud to announce that my future step son Alex who is 10 years old has just begun his training in our art. Of course we don't have a lot of room but it is quite sufficient for private and semi private classes. We hope to attract some dedicated students in the coming spring and summer months.

Here at the Guild we are still pursuing the Filipino styles for their exceptional in fighting skills and drills. We have developed many simple yet effective drills that complement our basics. with the purchase of a new digital camera and ( a much needed ) Dell computer we are now in the new millennium and hopefully we can send pics of the drills in the next news letter.

Somersworth, NH by Ikkyu Marty Richter: The Somersworth School of Self Defense has had a very busy fall/winter season. We started the fall season off by hosting a Brown Belt Exam. In early October, Chris Grover survived a very strenuous exam and was promoted to Sankyu. Congratulations and nice work Chris!!!

On December 14th, all of our advanced students were invited to take part in a special Brown Belt orientation seminar. Our sensei led us in discussions on the following topics: BST, the Brown Belt questions, Oral Exams and meditation. We all learned a great deal. We would like to thank Sandan Brian Vinciguerra for his gracious hospitality in hosting this event at his home.

We all experienced something very special on January 10th. Grandmaster Rose and Grandmaster Dusenbery held a Disciple workout that was attended by many of the Disciples from the East Coast area. Following the workout, Sensei Vinciguerra hosted a steak dinner at his home for all of the area's advanced students. During a presentation on the importance of our Art and the history that binds us together, the Grandmasters announced the promotion of Master Landers to the rank of 7th Degree Black Belt and that the Board of Director's of the C&S Self Defense Association agreed to promote our Sensei, Yondan Bruce Vinciguerra, to the rank of Godan - Fifth Degree Black Belt. I know that I can speak for all of the SSOSD students when I say that it is truly an honor to study under Master Vinciguerra for he carries within him a passion for our Art that burns brightly. In order to mark this important milestone, a dinner was held in Sensei's honor on Sat. Feb. 7th which was attended by students from all of the C&S schools around the East Coast. Although unable to attend, letters of congratulations were sent from Grandmaster Landers, Grandmaster Dusenbery and Grandmaster Mark Shuey - from Canemasters. It was also announced at the dinner that for all of his hard work and dedication in writing the first book on the basic techniques for Canemasters - Grandmaster Shuey has made Master Vinciguerra a member of the Board of Directors for Canemasters.

On Monday, Feb. 23rd, a few of our students attended a workout at Spinnaker Point, home of the Tai Chien Dojo. On this night we saw Sandan House's student, Tony Houde, earn his promotion to Green Belt. Thanks to Sandan House for inviting us to participate!!! In early March, SSOSD student Danny Dillon was promoted to Yellow Belt. We also welcomed into our program two new students, Alexandra Lucas and Ben Fitch.

In early March we had another special guest. Yondan Tom Thompson came from Colorado for a visit and a workout. Yondan worked with us extensively on improving our Chi Sao.

It has been exciting to see the various schools in the area working together more closely. We have attended each others classes and shared a lot of sweat together. We all look forward to working even more closely together in the future.

New email for Master Landers: candsdragon@mchsi.com

Well, Spring again! I trust it is so where you are, or nearly. I thought it was so two weeks ago until I got caught in a 16 inch Blizzard in Central Iowa. No matter how many Springs we see, we are always surprised and renewed by them. This is a good time to renew our dedication to ourselves and our progress in our Art. I always felt like New Years was a poor time for resolutions because it is such a poor time to begin anything other than vowing to keep your sidewalk shoveled. We at the Storm Dragon Schools have had some nice early Spring events, including a joint practice with Shodan Shuler's people, Yondan Larison's crew , and some of the Altamont boys, as well as some old faces appearing to rejoin the faithful. It is always nice to see that time really doesn't seem to dampen our feelings for our fellow practitioners and it is only a matter of moments before the old stories are told and retold. Enjoy the season and keep in touch with old friends. Our Art is too good a thing not to share.

What seems to have been a long winter is nearly gone; spring is almost here, and the rest of the new year ahead. Every year I run a 5-week self-defense class for the kids at the Rac Center where we have our classes. And it always seems to generate a few new students; well this year was no exception. With our new white belts our roster is now up to 16.

Everyone here is working hard on there next rank, we have two students moving close to Ikkyu, one to Nikyu and one to Sankyu. With a little more polishing and hard work, I'm sure they will all reach their goals.

Last November, Stacy (Purple Belt) and Jeremy Beek (Orange Belt) were proud parents of a baby girl, Jade Rose Beek. We welcome Jade into our Karate family.

Joshua Perkins is finishing up with his schooling and will join us full time in May. It has been a while since he worked out with us, however, Joshua is itching to get back into it.

Tai Chien Dojo also hosted the first, and hopefully many other, C&S New England Beginner/Intermediate Class. Those in attendance were Grandmaster Peter Rose, Sandan Tim House, Nidan Larry Holman, Mr. Scott Williams, Mr Rick Downs, Arthur Sourielle, Marty Richter, Stacy Beek, Tony Houde, Jeremy Beek, and Anjan Bose. The Class responsibilities were shared by the higher ranks so that everyone would have the opportunity to learn from others. Warmups were done by Arthur Sourielle (Ikkyu), Grandmaster Rose did the Basics, Sandan House ran the Drills, Nidan Larry Holman did Katas, Sandan House lead the 'Walking the Street', and Grandmaster Rose ended the night as center ring judge in Sparring. Everyone had a great time and we hope to host more in the near future.

Also, at the C&S New England Beginner/Intermediate Class, Tony Houde (from Tai Chien Dojo) received his Green Belt. Tony has become an exemplary student and dedicated to learning our Art by visiting the surrounding C&S programs: Rose School of Karate (Grandmaster Rose) in Portsmouth, NH and Somersworth School of Self Defense (Master Vinciguerra) in Somersworth, NH.

Grandmaster Dusenbery visited New England this past January and Tai Chien Dojo hosted a C&S Disciples Class, at Spinnaker Point Adult Recreation Center. Those in attendance were Grandmaster Rose, Grandmaster Dusenbery, Sandan Tim House, Sandan Brian Vinciguerra, Sandan Russ Jones, and Nidan Larry Holman.