Baton Rouge Iaido

Made it back to BR after a long, but fulfilling week at the 2026 Beikoku Tendai Iaido Kai Koshukai.

Congratulations to all of my students who attended--they represented the dojo well and were a big help in making it happen.

Congratulations to everyone who tested for their next rank. I can report that everyone passed! Official word will come from Japan in about a month, but here's the test candidates and the ranks they tested for:

Jentry Thomason, godan
Lu Xiaotian, rokudan
Joseph David, renshi
John Borne, kyoshi
Jon Pearson, kyoshi
Nicholas Wilson, kyoshi
John Lautermilch, junhanshi
Neil Melancon, junhanshi

Special thanks to Tanida Hiroshi sensei and Chikamoto Kazuhiko sensei who spent three long days training us and getting up at 4am this morning to catch a flight back to Japan!

Thank you, as always, to the BTIK Kaicho, John Ray sensei, without whom none of this would be possible.

Happy New Year/明けましておめでとうございます！

Today we had another successful Hatsunnuki, or first draw of the year. Weve had a successful year, with new students and a new dojo, but there's always room for more!

Also, we have a new web site we're launching soon to help provide more information about what we do. Hope 2026 is a great year for all!

BRI has completed a successful 2025 Louisiana embukai!

Some thanks are due first. John Lautermilch sensei led us through an intensive ashi waza (footwork) session Saturday afternoon. Immediately after, Jon Pearson sensei brought his experience as a flight instructor to a lecture about the nature of human error, how to recognize it and the best ways to manage them, with applicability to both iai and personal development.

It fit perfectly with this year's theme of chigai, or mistake/error/discrepancy. While this may seem like a funny theme, it is what we work on day in and day out--we look to our teachers for correct technique, but look to ourselves for error and deviation. How to handle mistakes, both technically and personally, is a major part of the path of iaido. Thanks once again to Nic Wilson sensei for his beautiful brushwork!

In addition, we did both tachi uchi no kurai and tsumeai no kurai, as well as an embu to cap the weekend off, so there was som serious practice in there, too.

Thanks once again to Wall to Wall Martial Arts for use of their dojo once again Saturday morning, as well as American Family Martial Arts for our new home.

Thanks also to Jentry Thomason for the pictures. A successful weekend and we look forward to next year!