Aikido Nippon-Kan

This page is no longer going to have current information about Aikido Nippon-Kan. If you would like to see current information, please visit our other page here.
https://www.facebook.com/nkdojo22/

Please also visit our website for current information.
https://www.nipponkan.org/

Here is also our general information and Class Schedule
Thank you all for your years of support!

AHAN NIPPON KAN AIKIDO
Nippon Kan is the largest Aikido dojo in the Rocky Mountain region. The school was founded in 1978 by Gaku Homma Sensei, who was a student of Aikido founder Morihei Ueshiba, as well as other high-ranking instructors, at the Iwama dojo in Japan. Homma Sensei was the last official uchideshi (live-in student) at Iwama dojo and is the best testimonial to the founder’s private life at Iwama during the last years of his life. After the founder’s death, Homma Sensei moved to the United States and opened his independent dojo. Homma Sensei is the creator of Nippon Kan’s unique teaching method that combines kenjutsu (sword techniques) and jojutsu (staff techniques) with taijitsu (open hand techniques).
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Aikido Nippon Kan (aka the Dojo)
Since 1978 in Denver, CO
​ Recruiting New Beginners Class Members!
Beginners Class Schedule
Taijutsu (Empty-Hand Techniques) Classes
Twice a week (Tuesdays & Thursdays) at 5:45 PM for 6 weeks / 12 classes total
Class B1: Start Date: September 23 (Tue)
End Date: October 30 (Thu)
Class B2: Start Date: October 14 (Tue)
End Date: November 20 (Thu)

Weapons Classes (Bokken & Jo)
Once a week on Wednesdays at 5:45 PM for 6 weeks / 6 classes total
Class W1: Start Date: September 24 (Wed)
End Date: October 29 (Wed)

Morning Classes
Once a week on Saturdays at 9:00 AM for 6 weeks / 6 classes total
Class M1: Start Date: September 27 (Sat)
End Date: November 1 (Sat)
Class M2: Start Date: October 25 (Sat)
End Date: November 29 (Sat)

AIKIDO NIPPON KAN Beginners Class Schedule Taijutsu (Empty-Hand Techniques) Classes Twice a week (Tuesdays & Thursdays) at 5:45 PM for 6 weeks / 12 classes total Class B1: Start Date: September 23 (Tue) ...

The First Set of Keikogi
Beginner students came dressed in their brand new keikogi.
Somehow it doesn’t feel settled in…But everyone started out like this.
When we try anything new that we challenge ourselves to take on, we all start the beginning of a long journey in a new endeavor with a mixed feeling of excitement and clumsiness.

This set of worn & torn keikogi was brand-new when my older sister bought it for me when I was 14 years old after having begged for one for so long.
She said to me, "Don't quit halfway through." Her words still stay with me.
The keikogi was of a larger size because she knew I would grow taller and bigger quickly, and I had to wear it for a while with the sleeves and the pant legs rolled up. I think I wore my-first-ever-keikogi for about five years. I still remember the excitement I felt when I put on my brand new keikogi for the first time.
“Never forget your shoshin (初心; a beginner's mindset with an attitude of openness, eagerness, and lack of preconceptions).”
I have been practicing Aikido for over 60 years, and I remain always willing and eager to share my decades of experience in Aikido with you.
Autumn classes for Beginners will start soon.
For more information, please see
https://www.nipponkan.org

Gaku Homma
Founder & Kancho, AHAN AIKIDO NIPPON KAN

It’s the day of a morning practice!
Despite treacherous road conditions in the morning as it had started snowing the night before, 6 youth class members came to a class to practice with their “genki” spirit!
Much praise goes not only to their parents and guardians for their support as safe drivers, but also to the instructors for their dedication to show up and teach a class when they don’t know how many students would come until the start of a class.
On a day like this, we decided to finish the class earlier to enjoy eating together something warm.
Everyone was treated with a bowl of udon soup with teriyaki chicken on top.
Everyone stepped up to the challenge of eating slippery udon noodles with a pair of chopsticks! Everyone did their best!

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Aikido Nippon Kan’s Youth Program has 45 years of history and experience in Denver alone.
Free trial session is available from 11:00AM on Saturdays, and no reservation is necessary.
Please come to check out our Youth Program on-site with your eyes, instead of and in addition to reviewing what is available on the Internet.

boy who reads…
While waiting to be picked up after a youth class…
“What are you reading?” “A science fiction…”
It was refreshing to see him reading an actual book, instead of using a smartphone or a tablet.
Good kids come together at Aikido Nippon Kan to learn Aikido.
Youth Classes at Aikido Nippon Kan
11:00AM ~ 12:00PM on Saturdays
Class enrollment application is accepted anytime.
Tel: 303-595-8256

Surrounded by Nature, I keep doing my daily routine one day at a time.
I ask, “Is this what “Shugyo” is about?”
I assure myself, “This must be the path of my “Shugyo” in Life…”
Although I don’t know who the photographer is for this photo, this is one of my favorites. (If anyone knows who this photo’s photographer is, please let me know.)

The next Beginners Class at Aikido Nippon Kan will start at 5:30PM on August 22, 2023. (The door opens at 5:00PM.).
Please call 303-595-8256 for details.

An Important Message from AHAN Aikido Nippon Kan,
a Non-Profit Organization.

It’s been confirmed that some organizations are getting on the bandwagon of the AHAN (Aikido Humanitarian Active Network) activities that Nippon Kan has been active on in order to pretend to be in some kind of relationship with the Headquarters of Nippon Kan to solicit monetary donations or to solicit becoming a sponsor.
AHAN Aikido Nippon Kan does not conduct any activities to ask any third parties for donations as part of AHAN activities. Additionally, I have not received any remunerations, even travel & transportation expenses, for the overseas seminars I have taught, and when local hosting organizations collect seminar fees from participants, the fees collected, minus such expenses as to lease a space for a seminar, have always been donated to local charitable organizations.
Moreover, it’s also worth noting that any instructional staff, including myself, have always taught as volunteers, and nobody has received any amount of remuneration from AHAN Aikido Nippon Kan.
Aikido Nippon Kan is an independent, non-profit organization, and Aikido Nippon Kan does not belong to any of several well-known Aikido organizations that exist. Therefore, Aikido Nippon Kan has maintained not only its ability to teach Aikido in a world that transcends the boundaries of affiliations or organizations, but also its mutually beneficial relationships with other organizations of different sizes. This has been one of important, long standing policies of Aikido Nippon Kan since its inception in 1978.
AHAN Aikido Nippon Kan has been operating in accordance with the applicable rules and regulations that a non-profit organization would have to follow, and anyone who is found interfering with this operating policy, the person could not only be reprimanded but also be suspended.
To date, over 20,000 people, who took interest in the practice of Aikido, have come and go through Nippon Kan’s Denver Dojo alone, and while there have been several people, out of the large number of people, who have opened and continued to operate their own dojos, each out of the vison of their own, none of them has any relationship with AHAN Aikido Nippon Kan.
Recently, I received multiple reports, and I have confirmed that a person, who had left Nippon Kan after having instigated much great confusion by planning a seminar within the Nippon Kan Dojo for personal benefits against the non-profit organization’s operating policy, had misappropriated photos, that are convenient for the person, from articles written by me and posted on my and Nippon Kan’s online pages, to self-promote while seemingly pretending that the person had left Nippon Kan amicably without seemingly any remorse of the person’s past conduct, and because such an assertion could lead to misunderstandings in the minds of Aikido-ka (Aikido practitioners) who do not know what had really happened, I have condemned the person.
There are several others like this person, for example, who appeared as a Sensei several months after abruptly leaving Nippon Kan or who made an announcement of baseless claims as an uchideshi when there was no official record that the persons had ever been an uchideshi.
While today’s social media sites can be quite a useful tool, because it’s awfully difficult to check on the degree of accuracy of information posted online, I urge and encourage everyone to diligently check on the credibility of any information or articles posted by anyone that even hints at having a relationship with AHAN Aikido Nippon Kan, and I would not hesitate to offer my cooperation to you in support of your effort to verify.
In recent years, there has been an increase in the number of people who teach Aikido, and while the continued development of the practice of Aikido regardless of affiliations and organizations is wonderful, there have also been cases where self-claimed instructors were standing in front of you and others who don’t know their past, after having left their base dojos not so in amicable ways (or were suspended by their home dojos), by putting on a different mask, and it’s highly encouraged for everyone to thoroughly check on any instructor’s practice history.

Gaku Homma
Founder and Kancho, AHAN Aikido Nippon Kan, a non-profit organization

Aikido Nippon Kan ~ since 1978 ~
About Upcoming Introductory Class for Beginners:
Start Dates and Time:
August 1 (Tue) and August 3rd (Thu); From 5:30PM to 7:00PM (The entrance door opens at 5:00PM.)
Free Trial Class
You are welcome to only view a class.
Kids’ class is also in session from 11:00AM on Saturdays.
Please check out this link for various activities by Nippon Kan: https://www.facebook.com/nkdojo22
For inquiries, please call (303) 595-8256.

Aikido Nippon Kan

https://www.facebook.com/nkdojo22
Please visit this site

Aikido Nippon Kan

Youth free Experience Class
10 children, aged from 8 to 14, participated in the special class this past Saturday.
Their parents and guardians were enjoying each other’s company in the lobby area while watching their children practice through a monitor in the lobby. And I always see it as a good opportunity to strike up a conversation with them.
“All of the children who came today are wonderful. We asked them to punch and kick, and none of them could do it. That was a relief. I don’t even want teach any child how to punch or kick. And this is what is starkly different between Aikido and other forms of martial arts that teach learners how to punch and kick. I am all of these children have been raised not to punch or kick, and hence, I see the as very good kids.”
“And here at Aikido Nippon Kan, we don’t teach these wonderful children to stand squarely against another person while making fists and being ready to kick the other person to seek only winning. In fact, first of all, there is no competition in the practice of Aikido. Through practicing Nippon Kan Aikido, learners learn not only Aikido techniques (i.e. “waza”), but also what we call conflict avoidance/conflict resolution techniques, and we at Aikido Nippon Kan, we aim at not just learning physical movements of Aikido’s different “waza”, but also applying the philosophies of Aikido in our daily lives, through practicing these techniques diligently and repetitiously. After all, Aikido is a Japanese Budo and is not a martial art which seeks to win in a fight or in a competition.
Please refer to this for more information about Aikido Nippon Kan’s Youth Experience Class.