Dave Hazard

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Dave Hazard (born 1952 in London) is a British 7th Dan Karateka and instructor of Shotokan karate and was one of the few students present at the very beginning of British Karate.^[1] He is a former KUGB national champion and British team member. Like many of the early karateka he first trained in judo before starting karate^[2] in 1969 at the Blackfriers club in London, where he trained under Keinosuke Enoeda, Hirokazu Kanazawa, Kato^[3] and Takahashi.^[4]

In 1977 Hazard went to Japan where he studied in Japan Karate Association (JKA) instructor classes under Masatoshi Nakayama.^[5]

In 1982 Mick Dewey formed the South of England Karate Union (SEKU). Dewey had been good friends with Hazard for many years and in 1985 invited Hazard to join himself and Mervyn O'Donnell in The South of England Karate Union. At this time Hazard lived in Leyton, East London, and Dewey arranged for him to join the Brighton Karate Club (Dewey had formed the club with Phil Elliott in 1974). Hazard accepted the invitation and moved from London to Brighton where he ran the club for nineteen years, serving as Technical Director and Grading Examiner to SEKU until he left and moved to Nottingham.

Later The 'South of England Karate Union' was renamed The Shotokan of England Karate Union. The Brighton Karate Club is now run by Jess Lavender a 7th Dan.

Hazard later left SEKU and is now the chief instructor of an international association in the form of the Academy of Shotokan Karate, which he founded in 2003,^[6] feeling in need of an environment that would allow him personally to evolve his approach to Shotokan Karate-Do. He is assisted within the ASK by senior instructors and karate-ka like Jeff Westgarth, Jess Lavender, Paul Herbert and Juli Pops. He is also the former kata coach for the England national squad, due to the restructuring of the EKGB. He brings to many training courses his expertise in kata and their applications to differing situations.