Wakakoma.be

At the first wednesday of July, those who weren’t on hollyday yet joined our last season’s training and said goodbye to Shota and his family.

Pictures can be found here:

Last May in Leiden (NL), took place the EKC where almost all National Teams of EKF Member-countries joined. For Belgium and its ABKF, a large number of the delegation were Wakakoma members.

Beside of the players, our dojo has sent two referees and the team manager.

Congratulations to all Belgian members for the hard work and fine results! Next year’s EKC will be held in Monténégro before heading for the 20th World Kendo Championships in 2027, Tokyo (J).

Last June, end of season and again the moment of intern dojo tournament. This year as well we had to say goodbye to one of our members who finished his term in Brussels and returned to Japan before his next assignment.

Many pictures of both events can be found here:

UETAKE san Farewel Keiko on 25Jun.2025

Wakakoma-Cup & Reception on 28Jun.2025 

*If you have more photo, please upload into this link album.

15th Keikokai was again a success last February! Thank you for your commitment to this annual highlight event for our dojo…

New edition of the annual frenchspeaking federation’s BKR tournament. This time, it was organised in Villes La Ville. Some of our members joined as players as well as referees.

As now usual 😉 our dojo had nice results in shiai but also afterwards for the shodan examination!

Dojo results at 2025 BKR tournament, yesterday June 8th:

1st place in Team competition

2nd in individual men competiition for Louis

1st place in individual female competition for Sae and 3rd place for Francesca

Special trophy for Sebastian as best young player before obtaining his shodan at the end of this perfect day…

Thanks a lot also to Manami Nakatani as our dojo manager as well as Yusuke Nakamura, Yo Kitashima, Christian Meunier, Yoshinobu Kurogi and Serge Hendrickx who act as referees…

On Sunday June 2nd, the regional federation “BKR” organised its 10th kendo tournament at Ransart (Charleroi). Almost 80 people from different affiliated BKR dojo took part in both men & ladies individuals as well as in a team tournament of 3 players.

Our dojo took part with a small group of 7 players and came back with some very nice results as you can read below:

Men individuals:

1st Place for Makoto, 2nd place for Takeshi and 3rd for Thomas.

Ladies individuals:

1st place for Yo and 2nd place for Sae

Team tournament:

“Hafu-Hafu” became the champions (Makoto, Takeshi & Thomas)

Other dojo members did also their very best even as our referees. Thanks a lot to “BKR” for this organisation and the nice tennugui…

Last weekend took place in Ghent the 30th edition of a individual tournament for youngsters below 18 years old in several categories as well as a team competition. Due to the anniversary, a special tournament with all former winners was also organised this year and the presence of two teachers from Japan.

Before the weekend, we had the opportunity to welcome both teachers, Hanabusa sensei (Kyoshi 8th dan) and Fukai sensei (Kyoshi 7th dan) at our Wednesday training. Many people attended this training and all dojo participants did very well at the competition. Several went into the medalists and Wakakoma even got GOLD in the team division!!

Thanks a lot to all parents, supporters, managers, referees and players for the wonderful weekend!

The results:

Individuals :
5-9 years technique
Yugo Maemoto 1st place

10-12 years shiai
Aori Senna 3rd place

13-15 shiai
Tomoki Takeuchi fighting spirit

16-18 shiai
Mattia Spaepen & Haruki Desmet 3rd places
Simon 1st place

19 and above  shiai
Toshiro Panzani & Makoto Grosfils 3rd places
Kota Kurogi 2th place

Team:
Wakakoma 1 (Saar, Keitaro, Kaede, Haruki, Mattia) 1st place

We received following information from Italy regarding a kendo camp for juniors. If you are interested in taking part, please inform Kurogi sensei without any delay…

Last Wednesday, a group of Toyota company had a nice team building activity at our dojo. This try-out was led by Kurogi sensei and Kendo National Team members member of our dojo.

These team members were recently selected by All Belgium Kendo Federation to take part in the upcoming World Kendo Championships in Milano (Italy).

If your company would like to organise similar team building; contact Kurogi sensei for details.

On April 14th took place in Havré (Mons) the annual individual tournament for “Dan”-holders.

Three categories are actually set up: Juniors (-18), Ladies and Men (18+). Three of our leading figures took part also as referees and a fresh member served as kakari-in. Parents and friends were also present to cheer and support our participants.

In the Junior category, Wakakoma got all possible medals: Haruki became 2024 champion, 2nd was Takeshi, joined 3rd Amaury & Simon. Sae got the “Fighting Spirit” award. Kaori was awarded the 3rd prize in “Ladies” and Makoto 2nd prize in “Men” categories. All results can be found at abkfevents.be website.

At the end of the day, the federation organised exams from 1st kyu up to 5th dan. Kotaro and Simon joined and obtained respectively 1st kyu and 2nd dan.

Congratulations to all participants and a big thank you to all for your commitment !