WKSA holds a number of tournaments all over the world during the calendar year.

We are fortunate that three of these tournaments are held in the UK being:

Scottish tournament held in Glasgow (usually held mid-end May)

European tournament (usually held end May/beginning June)

UK tournament (usually held end November)

Martial arts students are sometimes reluctant to participate in tournaments, but once they have participated in one, they get the “tournament bug”!

We encourage all our students to take part in tournaments.  Any student, child or adult from white belt upwards can compete.

There are various benefits to competing, here are a few reasons why:

Test your martial arts skills

As our belt gradings, tournaments offer students a chance to show what they can do.

Tournament competition tests mental and physical fitness in ways that training in class or gradings do not.

Overcoming nerves

Competing in tournaments can make students either nervous or have an adrenaline rush.  We are not able to replicate this in class!  However, we do give our students the tools to remain calm through their training and breathing to take control of this potentially stressful situation.  In turn, students can use this training in their every day life at school, college, university or work.

Increased Confidence

By stepping into a tournament ring and competing, even if you are nervous, you will finish feeling empowered knowing that you something that you did not feel comfortable with, but you still did it!

Stepping out of comfort zones

When we train in class, we get comfortable with our training. We get comfortable with our instructors, our class mates and training partners.  On getting comfortable it is easy fall into the trap of becoming complacent in our training and hitting a plateau.

Competing in a tournament means that you are in a new environment and performing in front of people you don’t know.  This means that students start to push themselves out of their comfort zones to perform better and improve their skills.

Test your skills against new opponents

When students spar with the same people in class, they learn how their classmate will move, their strengths and weaknesses.  However, when a student goes to spar in tournament, they do not know what their opponent will do.  It’s a great test for the student to “think on their feet”, to use their training in class to get their opponent to react and to use this information to score points.

Short term goal, long term gain

Registering for a tournament helps a student focuses their mind on their training.  As the tournament date gets closer, it’s a great motivation to pay attention to details on forms, techniques, sparring, weapons forms and board breaking.  Students “raise their game”, which is then continued after tournament, having broken through the “training complacency” barrier.

Character building

As in any competition, there is winning and losing.  Whilst we think all our students deserve a gold medal just for stepping onto the mats to compete, there will always be someone who is better on the day of tournament.   As martial artists, we learn to be humble and to congratulate others on their success.

Watch high level WKSA Masters in action

At each tournament there is always a WKSA Masters demo which is very inspiring to watch. It always motivates students to continue and improve their training.

Team Spirit

Tournaments give us, as a martial arts school, to grow closer together.  We spend time together, not only at the tournament, but socially as well.  We support each other when competing, cheering each other on.  We celebrate the small (and big) victories.  We have lots of fun and laughter!

Have Fun

Tournaments are fun and a great opportunity to meet and make friends from all over the world from our WKSA family.  You never know, you might just win a medal!

We never expect our students to do something if we have not done it ourselves.  Both PKJN Steve and KSN Sally have regularly competed and judged over the years at WKSA tournaments.  We always ensure that our students (and their supporting family and friends) know what to expect to make tournaments an enjoyable event.

If you are interested in participating, please let us know!