While practicing karate at a training camp in Japan, senior Kai Nakamura was invited to train alongside professionals including a former karate world champion, an MMA fighter and a Japanese karate fighter.
“They would adjust things like which part of my body goes first,” said Nakamura. “And I feel like that had an impact on me now and then. [The adjustments] are just kind of like muscle memory now.”
Nakamura attended Keio University in Japan where he trained with students over the summer in 2023 and 2024. He first found out about the opportunity to train at Keio from Junna Tsukii, a former karate world champion who led a seminar at the dojo Nakamura attends back home.
“So when my dad and I were looking for places, [Tsukii] just happened to say, ‘Oh, I coach at Keio,’” said Nakamura. “So we ended up picking that.”
Nakamura’s training at Keio Universitytypically involved agility work with ladders, ankle strengthening exercises, ab workouts and alternating hand isolation drills, he said.
“There’s a little bit of messing around before class,” said Nakamura. “But the second it hits 6 [p.m.] … It was like a switch. Everyone focused up, got in line and then it was just 100 percent from the beginning. Warming up hard and then training hard.”
At first, Nakamura struggled to keep up with the otheruniversity students, he said.
“They are already used to doing three hours a day, every single day,” said Nakamura. “So just trying to keep up at their pace was too much.”
According to Daniel Duarte, senior at Whitney M. Young, who joined Nakamura at Keio University, Nakamura is very analytical with his approach to training.
“He isn’t much of a do, do, do,” said Duarte. “He is more of a, ‘Let me think about this and how I can adopt what they’re teaching and what I already know works for me to better my techniques in karate.’”
According to Tony Nakamura, Kai Nakamura’s father, who coaches him in karate, he noticed physical differences when Kai Nakamura returned from Japan.
“I can no longer take him down on the floor easily,” said Tony Nakamura. “He’s faster, he’s stronger and he’s much more tolerant to pain.”
According to Kai Nakamura, he hopes to go to college at Keio University.
“Every time I go there, I train hard enough where I grow a little bit,” said Kai Nakamura.“When I was out of shape, I was like a really rusty, broken, slow-moving machine. But by the time I came back, I was nice and fluid.”