Not just individuals, thousands of families around the world are realizing the physical and psychological benefits of attending karate classes. When the families get home from karate training, the parents, just like individuals, are online, looking for the karate moves that they just practiced at the dojo.

In today’s fast paced world, it is great to be able to access karate tutorials online. You can then learn karate online, from anywhere and at any time, the internet truly is, an incredible phenomenon.

Saying that, there are some words of caution when trying to learn karate online.

1. You have no Sensei (teacher), watching over you at home.
2. Bad habits can quickly develop.
3. It is sometimes hard to focus, when you are practicing on your own.
4. When practicing the karate kata (forms), space may be an issue.

So here are a few tips to apply when trying to learn karate at home.

1. I always make a quick note of the karate moves, I am about to practice.
2. When I have finished each exercise, I always tick or cross out, on my list of karate moves
3. Be strict with your time allotted for each exercise and STICK to it.
4. If you can, at the next karate class, ask your sensei to check your karate techniques.

The internet is an incredible resource and training tool, try not to just work on technique, look into the history and philosophy of the martial arts. As master Gichin Funakoshi said, ‘The ultimate aim of the art of Karate lies not in victory or defeat, but in the perfection of the characters of its participants’. Ossu!

Do you know the feeling I am referring to when I talk about being on autopilot? Perhaps you have driven to training in your car and could not even remember the trip? Perhaps your coach has been talking to you and you couldn’t hear anything. Are you just going through the motions? These are all symptoms of being on autopilot. Being on autopilot, for a whole training session means you have not improved.

To ensure you are not on autopilot you simply need to focus on what is going on around you. Listen, see, feel, taste and smell your environment. Get in touch with your surrounds and tune in to them. This is the first part of consciously training.

Once you have done this, engage your brain! Think about what you are doing. The technique you are executing, what this feels like, what results is this creating for you. Are you going better doing this particular technique? What if you tried something different? Do something different and see what happens. Talk to your coach about what you are doing. Engage with those around you.

Try to create an exercise to break down your technique into its individual components. When I was rowing, we would change our grip purely to activate different muscle groups or to isolate movements and exaggerate them. Making these continual changes ensures we were always thinking. We would row and with each stroke do something different with our oar or we would stop at different parts of the stroke purely to break our routine movements up and to check our timing within the boat. The bottom line is, all of these activities and exercises ensured we did not lose concentration.

Most people struggle to concentrate fully for more than 7 minutes. Work with this and plan some mini breaks in your training. It may be a short break each ten minutes or, as we would do, have a switch off time every so often. Then switch back on and consciously complete the training session with high awareness of what you are doing.

I can guarantee, if you do train consciously, then you improve faster than your competitors. Most athletes operate on a relaxed mode of autopilot, switching on and off in an unconscious manner. Most athletes do not improve as fast as their coach likes them to. Be an athlete who controls yourself. Train with a purpose. Train with consciousness.