Practicing Karate – Saratoga Shotokan Karate Dojo

Membership in the YMCA

If you are already a member practicing with us, your YMCA membership helps ensure our dojo will continue to enjoy the facilities provided by the Saratoga Southwest YMCA. The YMCA provides facilities to many clubs, including the Saratoga Dojo, and it uses enrollment statistics to determine whether to continue or suspend an activity such as our Karate practice.

Please keep your YMCA membership current!

Choices for membership include family YMCA membership, individual YMCA membership, and membership just for Karate practice.

For YMCA membership questions please contact the Southwest YMCA at (408) 370-1877 or see a staff member at the front desk for details.

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Reading list

Required:

Karate-do Kyohan: The Master Text by Gichin Funakoshi
Karate-do: My Way of Life by Gichin Funakoshi [Autobiography of Master Funakoshi – suitable for all ages].
Notes on Training by Tsutomu Ohshima
The Heart of Karate-Do by Shigeru Egami

Highly recommended:

Book of Five Rings by Miyamoto Musashi (Bantam Books)
The Art of War by Sun Tzu
The Sword of No-Sword: Life of the Master Warrior Tesshu by John Stevens
The Unfettered Mind: Writings of the Zen Master to the Sword Master by Takuan Soho
The Sword and the Mind by Yagyu Munenori,
Hagakure: The Book of the Samurai by Yamamoto Tsunetomo
Ideals of the Samurai: Writings of Japanese Warriors by William Scott Wilson
The Code of the Samurai by Yuzan Daidoji
Karate-Do Nyumon: The Master Introductory Text by Gichin Funakoshi
The Twenty Guiding Principles of Karate: The Spiritual Legacy of the Master by Gichin Funakoshi
Karate Jutsu: The Original Teachings of Gichin Funakoshi
Three Budo Masters by John Stevens
Forty-Seven Ronin Story by John Allyn
Musashi by Eiji Yoshikawa