Annual General Meeting this Saturday 12pm

This Saturday, 2nd May, we will be having our Annual General Meeting (between the sessions of Tai Chi and Jujutsu) at 12 noon in the MEAC.

All current financial BBRD members are welcome and invited to attend. You must be financial to vote. Have your say in the future directions in our Club!

At the AGM we elect our club executive members: President, Secretary and Treasurer, for this year. Maybe you are thinking of standing for a position? This is your chance! We also hear about the happenings of the last year and what may be coming up ahead.

Jujutsu training will follow on from the AGM, which is not anticipated to take up a great deal of time. 

Hope to see you all there!

Saturday Jujutsu — Nage waza

Saturday's class (after the Club's AGM) will be the first of the month, and we will be transitioning from our focus on kansetsu waza (joint locks) to nage waza (throws and take downs). I always love this month as it provides an excellent opportunity to focus on the entire "package" of jujutsu — entering, unbalancing, footwork and body movement.

We will also be preparing for gradings up to potentially yon kyu, at the end of this month. For anyone contemplating presenting for a grade, please make sure that you talk with Michael ASAP about your eligibility and the criteria for the grade you wish to test for.

Will not be at Kendo this Wednesday

Unfortunately, Michael will not be able to attend Kendo at the University on Wednesday as he has been asked to participate in an event down in Springfield that afternoon and will not be back in time.

Those that wish to practice can still use the space, and we will confirm with the Club's kendoka whether Jason Winchester will be available to direct traffic.

We will be back to usual next week, and look forward to seeing as many there as can make it.

Membership form reminder

Just a quick note to remind everyone to fill out a 2015 Membership form ASAP so that we can set up the new database, and a big thank you to everyone who has already done so!

If you haven't done so yet, could you please give your paperwork to your relevant instructor this week.

Social Media experiment

I'm just wanting to run a little bit of a social media experiment with the Club's Facebook  page over the next few weeks, and would love if everyone on the Club's distribution list could help out.

First up, if you are a Facebook user and haven't "liked" the Club's Facebook page, please do so. Second, for the next two weeks, could you "like" the posts that come through on the page.

I'm hoping that we can continue to grow the reach of of the Page over the next month so that we might get more traffic both through the Club's various channels and in class. By liking things, you will see more of the Club's material come through your news feed, and more importantly, so too will your broader network of friends.

To that end we well also be putting up a new You Tube channel in coming weeks and try and re-syndicate some of the best martial arts related content that we find on the Net.

Andrew Seyerhelm seminar wrap up

I just wanted to once again say a big thank you to Andrew Seyderhelm for the seminar he delivered on Saturday. We managed to work through a six and a half hour dump of "practising Systema" — and as such we still didn't even get to all of the planned content!

Andrew's approach to the material, as always, was clear an insightful. We have many things big and small to practice over coming months. I'm sure everyone can still feel the outcome of the "mind in the elbow" heavy striking session. We have Andrew's notes from the day, so we will be working from them starting this Tuesday night.

I really enjoyed being able to spend the day with everyone, meeting new friends like Tony Dunne and catching up with old friend like Michael Conroy (who we hope to see a little more of in coming weeks!).

For those that missed out this time, we are going to tray and organise him to come up in the second half of the year, once he and the family have settled into Canberra for his new job in the AFP.

Andrew Seyderhelm Seminar this weekend

It is finally here!

Andrew will be up this Saturday to deliver a full-day Russian Martial Arts Seminar at the MEAC. I've been looking forward to this since before Christmas, and it promises to be a jam packed day.

There will be two sessions 10am–1pm and 2–5pm, with catch up drinks afterwards.

Attendance is $40/50 for a session or $60/80 for the day for BBRD members/Guests. You can pay via the Club website.

Kendo keiko at Springfield

Just a quick note to say that after a couple of trial sessions, the Club is proud to offer a Kendo training session at Springfield campus on a Friday.

Please let Michael know if you are wanting to train Friday lunchtime (12–1.30pm) and whether you might require a loan of some equipment so he can pack sufficient gear onto the bus in the morning.

Thanks to everyone who helped on Saturday

Easter Saturday certainly was damp, but the camaraderie certainly shone through during the inaugural BBRD fund raising barbecue at Bunnings.

We managed to raise a little under $900 profit from the day, which puts us just shy of half way to getting another 10 training mats! We will certainly be looking to run a few more fund raisers this year to continue expanding the training surface.

Many thanks to everyone who contributed to the day — Melissa, Tracey, David, James, Meg, Brady, Adam, Helen, Greg. Special mention to Peter Whitticker for the loan of the big arse esky. And of course a huge round of thanks to Sian Carlyon who, on top of being there for the full day and taking turns at various roles in the production line, did the lions share of the logistics and materiel organisation for the day — literally could not have done it without you!

2015 MJER Sword Raffle

Hello All,

I able to offer some tickets in the MJER Sword raffle; there are a few left for Toowoomba.  Each ticket is $10.00 and gives you a more-than-average chance of winning; there are only around 90 tickets being sold for this prize.  You can call in at the dojo during training times, or contact Adam Brannigan directly for tickets.  We are offering a very interesting black-coated live blade with custom furnishings; the one topmost in the image .  It certainly is unique.  I recommend purchasing tickets soon.