Goju Karate Seminar - January 21, 2012

Our next seminar with the Palm Bay Dojo will be on Saturday 1/21.Time will be from 11am to 3pm. Topics will include proper breathing and breaking techniques. Download Flyer.

Tampa Family Martial Arts Annual Picnic - February 11, 2012

TFMA is hosting it's annual picnic on 2/11 and we are invited! Students - please plan to attend!

Weapons Seminar - October 22, 2011

American Tactical Goju hosted a Weapons Seminar featuring Soke Joe Hess and special guest Master Jack Hogan. The seminar started with how to target pressure points. Next it moved on to cover some basics of the Bo, Sai, and Nunchaku. Everyone had a great time! We are looking forward to doing this again next year! At the conclusion of the seminar Sensei Jim Chambers was extremely surprised by a promotion by Soke Hess and the attending Masters. Photo Album.
Black Belts group picture:

General Information

Our karate schools are located in Riverview and Gibsonton, Florida southeast of Tampa. We offer traditional and professional martial arts instruction in American Goju Ryu Karate. Classes are offered for children, teens and adults. We do not offer after school programs since we are focused strictly on karate training with no distractions.

Karate helps people to develop confidence, improve agility, gain focus, and learn self defense. Classes normally start with warm up exercises and progress into specific areas such as floor drills, basic blocking and striking, forms known as katas, bunkai application, self defense against many types of attacks, and sparring. Skills take time to learn so the student must have patience.

A few of the students on a testing day.

Our goal is to build good character and quality individuals who respect themselves and those around them. Proper attitude is mandatory for development. Although some martial arts focus on the sport aspects such as tournament training we prefer to focus on real world skills development. This includes a strong emphasis on self defense and fighting abilities. Traditional kata is utilized for discipline and gives the student a fighting dictionary.

Potential students should understand that the belts in Karate come as by product of working hard and learning the requirements for each rank. We have five main belt colors which are white, green, purple, brown and black. When a student reaches black belt they are really just starting to understand the basics and grow as a person. Black belt is the real beginning of the journey to self improvement. For the impatient this concept will be difficult. We do not sell rank or give it out easily. Everyone must earn their way.

The head instructor is Sensei Jim Chambers who has been involved in the martial arts for over 40 years. Over 30 years have been directly within USA Goju. He has taught in dojo's across Florida including Palm Bay, Melbourne, Riverview and Gibsonton. He also teaches Kobudo. Weapons include Nunchaku, Sai, Tonfa, Long Bo, Short Bo, Kama, Short Stick, Sword and Yawara/Kubaton.