West Wind Dojo Remote Membership Program
Become a personal student of Rick Hotton Sensei by joining the West Wind Dojo remote program!
weekly live class time on Zoom with Hotton Sensei
direct suggestions on technique
discussion period in each class
After becoming familiar with him through the videos on his YouTube channel or training with him at a seminar, people often express a desire to learn with Hotton Sensei on a regular basis, to experience his curriculum as taught in his home dojo classes and add what he teaches to their personal practice.
That opportunity is now available through the West Wind online program. For a monthly fee, you can join a weekly live class on Zoom in which Hotton Sensei teaches his curriculum and shares his unique emphasis and philosophy that inspires many people to deepen their relationship with their own practice. His encouragement to “find your own karate” while in the pursuit of technical excellence is built into all his instruction, including through this online program.
We will be adding new class times regularly, based on demand. Since interest has been global, we offer a variety of time options to make it feasible to attend class live for those in many different time zones.
To join this program, please get in touch with us at info@sundaymorningkeiko.org or use the contact form on this page. We will discuss class time options and provide details of how the program is structured and how to register. The fee is $75/month, which includes four live 1-hour classes on Zoom each month and access to recordings of those classes for a limited time. (Months when there are fewer than four classes due to Rick Sensei's travel schedule, holidays, or other interruptions have a reduced fee.)
Each class includes a discussion period during which students are welcome to ask questions and offer reflections, whether on the topic of that particular class or other aspects of their practice. Sessions are recorded and available for enrolled students to review for a limited time following each class. Each class group progresses together through the curriculum, gaining a shared understanding of how Rick Sensei's philosophy and methods can inform their own existing body of knowledge. Classes are limited in size to facilitate everyone having the chance for personal feedback.
This program began in 2021. The community that has grown through these online classes is remarkable. People around the world gather each week to learn with Rick Sensei using his curriculum, to receive feedback, ask questions, and reflect on the general philosophy of a martial practice with deeper meaning beyond simply utilitarian skills. While remote learning through this venue naturally has some limitations, we've found that the growth and connection made possible by this process are of enormous value. Many people in the program were already advanced practitioners when they joined, with regular attendance in person at a local dojo, some who are instructors themselves, and many from styles other than Shotokan. Rick Sensei's foundation is traditional Shotokan, and his curriculum is built on that tradition, yet it also includes principles from other styles, other martial traditions, and those discovered through his deep personal inquiry into his own practice. It includes requirements of kihon, kata, kumite, kobudo work with jo, nunchaku, and tonfa, as well as techniques from aikido melded with karate principles.
To read more about the benefits of and reasons for online training, please click here: Why Online Training?
EXISTING CLASS TIMES (all US Eastern time):
Mondays 1:00pm
Mondays 9:00pm
Tuesdays 7:00pm
Thursdays 3:00pm
Thursdays at 7:00pm
Fridays 3:00pm
To join, please email us at info@sundaymorningkeiko.org or use the contact form on the bottom of this page.
Included below are video clips taken from some of these online classes and testimonials from current students in the program.
video clips from live online classes
West Wind online class with Rick Hotton Sensei instructing on haito uchi (ridge hand strike)
West Wind online class with Rick Hotton Sensei, discussion of mawashi uke.
West Wind online class with Rick Hotton Sensei, example of the q&a time included in each class.
West Wind online class with Rick Hotton Sensei, kobudo training with the jo.
testimonials from students
The wave of popularity of karate in the seventies captured my generation and made us focus on sporting results in various federations in Europe. After 25 years of training and a 15-year break, the recent pandemic reminds me that the spirit of Budo is in each of us. Without much expectation, I signed up for training with Sensei Rick and found a feedback that far exceeded my expectations. Excellent technical skills are accompanied by an intelligent pedagogical approach that encourages personal responsibility for one's own development. Direct questions were answered in a very appropriate manner that I would have otherwise waited forever for. Very deeply connected to the traditional principles of Karate and Aikido, but never end questioning them. Distance training stopped being a barrier, and authorities of the orthodox kind are replaced by an accessible, experienced, and very inspiring friendly Sensei Rick.
Dragan (nidan in Shotokan karate)
Croatia
I have been a member of Sunday Morning Keiko for some time now and commenced Rick Sensei’s weekly online classes in July 2021. Our class has become friends over time, some of us have actually met up and trained together in person.
Sunday Morning Keiko is a world wide community of like minded Karateka. I look forward to the classes which definitely enhance and guide my own teaching and training in the UK. Over the last year we have steadily worked through the dojo’s Karate syllabus which includes weapons training and Aikido basics.
Rick Sensei’s detailed knowledge of Karate has enabled further detailed study of my body movement and aided my thought processes that lie beyond each punch, kick or stance.
I would throughly recommend joining the zoom classes. Although the training is not in person, this is not a barrier to learning or being critiqued via webcam. Join the community, meet other dojo members from around the world and learn the essence of Karate from the world renowned ‘YouTube’ famous Karate expert Rick Hotton Sensei.
Nick Bland, Nidan Karate & Shodan Aikido
West Wind Dojo Remote student
Ren Ryu Karate, Surrey, UK
Being a part of the online West Wind Dojo program has been the biggest blessing. Not only is the attentiveness, instruction and teaching such high quality, Rick Sensei is warm, welcoming and truly values all our input whilst encouraging our own unique journey. A community and friendship! We work through the West Wind curriculum in a structured way, but explore all the important intricacies and principles involved in movement itself. Teaching mindfulness and feeling, Rick Sensei guides us to have the courage to step out of the rigid box of what we think karate should be, and into a liberated, dynamic, grounded and organic way of training, which brings us deeply into the present moment.
The quality of my karate has evolved such a tremendous amount... it feels so much more relaxed, natural and alive. The connection to my centre and being has enriched my day to day life in a huge way, and I am so very grateful. For those wanting to explore a deeper level in their training, this is an avenue so very worth it! How I perceive training has changed so much as a result, and my level of excitement and vigour for training is always growing with each session we have, not to mention constantly being inspired. It has been an honour and joy to be a part of this!
Simon Kovac
Victoria, Australia
Before my wife and I started training with Rick Sensei, I found his channel on YouTube and was extremely intrigued. I often tried to apply what he was sharing in his videos in my own training and very often quoted and shared his concepts with the students that I was training.
Although it wasn’t possible for us to travel to train with him, I often told others that if I could learn from one person, it would be him. Fast forward to 2020 and the worldwide adoption of Zoom and the ability to train remotely, we had the opportunity to train with him and other like-minded martial artists searching for a different path.
His down-to-earth approach, decades of experience, and guidance on finding our own Karate has opened up many new dimensions to our training. His emphasis on body awareness and a more spiritual approach to getting out of our own heads is something that resonates very deeply with us.
Rick Sensei’s provocation to break out of the confines of what Karate should look like from pictures in a book to instead, finding what works and feels right to you is only one of the greatest benefits of training with him.
Additionally, Rick Sensei is willing to share his experience with anyone who is willing to learn, regardless of style without judgment and more importantly without any politics.
If you want to improve your Martial Arts skills, learn from someone who lives what he teaches, and become part of a family community, Rick Sensei and West Wind Dojo / Sunday Morning Keiko is the perfect place to be.
Doug and Deneise Wojtczak
Illinois, US
I am a long time student of Rick Hotton Sensei and member of Sunday Morning Keiko. I live four hours from Sarasota. Before Covid hit and the advent of Zoom, several times a year I’d either hit the road at 6am on Sunday mornings and drive to Sarasota to train with him, or my wife and I would drive down on a Saturday afternoon and get a hotel room and rise at a much more civilized time for me to train at Sunday Morning Keiko.
I was more than happy to do this because I was training with one the best karate sensei in the world. In the world. Four hour drive? Well worth it to learn from his wonderful insights and techniques and unique martial philosophy.
But now, with Zoom classes, I train and interact with Hotton Sensei twice a week. Turn on the computer and train with this world class teacher who never fails to challenge and encourage me to “discover my own karate” while always standing on the firm foundation of the basics.
I encourage all serious karate or other martial art students, from white belts to Shodan, Nidan, Sandan and beyond to take advantage of these Zoom classes with Hotton Sensei. They are an investment well worth it.
Miles Owens
Florida, US
In the early stages of the pandemic, with my local dojo shut down and a feeling of aimlessness seeping into my own training, it was a long-time mentor who sent me in Rick Sensei’s direction. In spite of any trepidation and anxieties I carried into that very first weekend Zoom seminar, what I immediately discovered was a community that is welcoming, approachable, and above all, enlightening. When the door to remote West Wind membership had been opened a year later, what other choice but to heed Funakoshi Sensei’s advice and keep going inward.
Rick Sensei advocates a uniquely holistic approach to one’s practice. While the technical instruction is truly first class, it is the constant provocation to seek and foster deeper connections with one’s self and environment that extends well beyond the dojo floor into everyday life. And to top it off, it is an absolute joy to be doing this alongside so many gifted and genuinely warm karateka who approach their training in the same spirit of inquiry and openness as Rick Sensei.
David O’Brien
Syracuse, NY, US
For me, the opportunity to train remotely with Hotton Sensei has been a true blessing. I have been training off & on since the early 80s but had fallen away from karate for more than a decade due to life’s twists & a few serious injuries. My previous knowledge of Rick Sensei was minimal, just a late 90s VHS I owned and an older Shotokan Magazine interview, but thankfully I found his excellent karate videos on YouTube during the lockdowns. As anyone who watches his videos can see, he has not only unique & excellent karate technique but a refreshing humbleness, warmth & humour that is genuine and infectious.
I jumped at the offer for West Wind small group online training because I was in need of a jump start and a way back into the karate training path. I am honoured to be his student because I saw a long time ago on those videos that Hotton Sensei had “something” in his personal SMK JKA/Shotokan/Aikido style (“no style!”) and I always thought it would be amazing to have the chance to train with him.
Using his vast knowledge of karate & aikido, body dynamics, and melded with a few heretical karate views he encourages his students to discover their own personal karate as well. The weekly classes are an opportunity to not only train and learn but to connect with people from across the planet who have become a karate community & family. Personally, the online curriculum pace has allowed my body to restrengthen while taking off the layers of rust that accumulated on my technique. Hotton Sensei’s interaction with every member in our class, be it instructing, critiquing, answering questions or telling a story is invaluable.
If your karate training is in need of a new perspective, a spark to reignite your interest or if you need a guide back onto the path... I strongly encourage you to give Rick Hotton Sensei’s West Wind online training and yourself a chance.
John Dizy
Alberta, Canada
So thankful being a little part of this program. Rick Sensei shows us his karate and how to make your karate yours. Less is more and more is more. Something that seems simple indeed has the root connected to everywhere. Out there, is another metaverse beyond just karate matrix outer physical shell. Everything is everything and is nothing. It opens up everything when sensei said something profound doesn’t have to look perfect.
We all walk the path. Grateful sensei shows his. Can’t thank him enough.
Ekapol Rojpiboonphun
Thailand
Rick is an outstanding sensei who has perfected the art of online teaching in a way that few can match. His classes are clear, systematic and inspirational, and you are guaranteed a warm welcome.
Desmond Danes
UK
“Though the door is narrow, you must go deeply in,” always sticks in my mind when training with Hotton Sensei. It is so intriguing to break down each technique and find how our internals can create the externals. Part surgeon, part poet. Fabulous combination. I didn’t think online classes would fit me, but I enjoy the camaraderie from other karateka from all over the world. It’s a safe and inviting environment free of judgment where we can discuss our own karate, openly. His aiki principles have helped me with fluidity and softness in my karate, which has then helped me move through life with these two valuable qualities.
Domo arigato, Hotton Sensei.
Karen MacDonald
Petaluma Karate Club, CA
The first time I saw a You Tube video of Hotton Sensei’s teaching, especially his demonstrations of the technique he was describing, I knew I was seeing the real embodiment of karate. He seemed to be exactly the sort of karateka that my original sensei in Chicago, Sugiyama Sensei, tried to bring forth from each of his students: sharp, powerful technique, deceptively simple execution, a clear unperturbed mind, immaculate synchronization of body and mind.
Shortly after I saw those first videos, I underwent open-heart surgery and consequently found my own training significantly sidelined, but watching Rick Sensei’s videos helped me keep my mind focused on the ultimate goal: to make our technique more perfect from whatever place we find ourselves in life. That is what a really good teacher inspires: the enthusiasm of his or her students to go well beyond their current level of development. But there’s more to Rick Sensei’s gift.
Since that time, I’ve had the opportunity to train with Sensei once in person (five months post-surgery) and, for the last year, weekly through his virtual classes. I’ve used many of his examples as fodder in teaching my own students. As I move through my 45th year of training myself and my 25th year as a sensei, I have an ever-renewed sense of optimism and clarity regarding the next phase of training, and the one after that.
At the beginning of one’s training in Karate, achieving the rank of Shodan looks like a far-off castle perched on a mountaintop. When I was young, one of my sempai once said once you reach that place the castle is “nothing more than a broken-down old shack,” but then you can see that there is another castle, higher and more distant than your original destination, and you set forth once again. And so on.
Training once one has reached the dan ranks takes on a more subtle character, much harder to capture in words, more elusive and ephemeral, and like zen, it’s almost as though once you try to express it in words, you can be sure you’re already well off course. This teaching is referred to in some circles as “yudansha” level training, though (again) even giving it a label is deceptive. Prior to my meeting Rick Sensei, even my best teachers seemed to know exactly what they were striving to impart (and could embody it for the most part) but they lacked the words to convey it. Rick Sensei is a great teacher not just because he makes Karate accessible to beginners and intermediate students—absolutely necessary for our art to flourish—but especially because he is able to convey very potently, through his teaching and his example, those very subtle and elusive concepts necessary to the improvement of us yudansha-level students. It’s his genius. I salute him.
With respect,
Paul Marren
Wisconsin, US
As a long-term practitioner of Shotokan in both Ohshima and JKA variations, Sensei Rick’s approach has been a revelation. He blends the best elements of these and other sources—like Aikido—to provide a comprehensive approach while constantly challenging us to make our karate personal. Each class is full of insights that allow this personal journey to build momentum without ever sacrificing the applicability and effectiveness of the techniques and training methods. And this practical approach is augmented by his broader wisdom, which provokes us to find the spiritual potential of this deep art. Indeed, each class seems to contain both references to the science behind what we do as well as lessons about how to apply this outside of the dojo and live your life more fully. I highly recommend these interactive Zoom classes for anyone ready to push their karate to a new level. He provides a roadmap to the many possibilities for karateka ready for the “ha” in Shuhari.
Vaughn Becker
Arizona, US