09/05/2025
Shotokan Karate Magazine Issue 164 JUNE 2025
FEATURES JULIE NICHOLSON 7th Dan HDKI
Julie Nicholson was born in Jarrow, Tyne & Wear in the North East of England in November 1964. She began her Shotokan karate training in 1975. We featured an earlier interview with Julie in SKM Issue 66 February 2001. So, it’s interesting to now read her views and ideas after 24 more years of continuous training, plus her extensive teaching experience. Many subscribers in the UK and in Europe will know Julie Nicholson from her incredibly successful competition days where she had a fantastic career. She won 15 KUGB Kata titles and was a three-times European Kata Champion. Julie Nicholson made history in 2001 at the KUGB National Championships when she became the first woman to become Grand Champion. She won both the Individual Kata and Kumite events. Julie was an active member of the KUGB National Squad from 1983 until 2001 when she retired from International Competition. From the beginning of her career Julie was coached by her husband, John Holdsworth sensei 7th Dan, who provided the structure, guidance and encouragement to keep going in order to reach her goals. Both are now members of HDKI. I think it’s fair to say that SKM is more focused on featuring karateka who have passed the competition years of their own karate journey. From the conversations I’ve had, that goes for many subscribers/readers of the magazine. It’s a period which many karateka go through. l would like to conduct more interviews with younger karateka but the majority only want to talk about their competition career or tournament karate in general. Again, we have a good, varied choice of articles in this issue, one very interesting piece by Tim Hanlon (USA) a student of the late Hidetaka Nishiyama regarding teaching karate; namely, are instructors actually, ‘Showing or Showing Off’.
Editor.
https://www.shotokanmag.com/
