Karate and running on Nuns’ Island: what the dojo adds to your kilometres

01The short answer

02What the dojo adds for a runner

The upper body. Running engages the legs and the breath; karate also engages the arms, shoulders, hips and trunk — every strike starts from the hip, every block is held with the back. That is not a promise about your stride, it is simply what the hour will ask that the road does not.

Directions. A run goes forward; an hour at the dojo goes forward, backward, sideways, pivoting, and changes footing with every technique — Kyokushin techniques gives the catalogue.

Measure. A runner measures in distance and time; a karateka measures in what they can do. Ten kyu to the black belt, each with written requirements, and no stopwatch — Kyokushin karate belts describes them. For someone who lives with a watch, it is another way of progressing.

03A complete programme, in the same hour

In the WKO Shinkyokushinkai first-year textbook, an examination covers kihon, ido geiko, kata, conditioning (knuckle push-ups, jumping squats), flexibility and kumite. Conditioning — knuckle push-ups, jumping squats — and flexibility are graded like technique: a runner finds there the repetition they know, applied to muscles the road asks little of. Kyokushin body conditioning describes what that covers.

The 2024 Adult Compendium of Physical Activities gives each described activity a MET value — a multiple of the energy spent at rest. Jogging at a self-selected pace is listed at 7.5, running at 9.7 km/h at 9.3 and at 11.3 km/h at 11.0; karate at a moderate pace is at 10.3, and a beginner’s slower practice at 5.3. These values describe an activity as it was observed, not your class or your game: a beginners’ class is closer to karate’s 5.3 at a slower pace than to 10.3. An hour at the dojo run at a good pace therefore sits between a run at 9.7 and one at 11.3 km/h: a runner does not lose their cardio there, they do it differently.

04Winter, and the days without a run

If you run less in winter, the dojo is indoors, at the same hours all year. If you run year-round, the question is the week: Is twice a week enough? says what a running plan can absorb, and one class a week is already a start. The trial class is there to see how the body reacts — barefoot, in low stances — rather than to decide on the spot.

05The partner

Running is done alone, or side by side. In kumite someone is in front, and they do not cooperate — What is Kyokushin kumite? says how that work is introduced, graded and supervised. It is the part of the hour no run contains, and the one runners who try the dojo were not expecting.

06Your running keeps its plan

Stride, cadence, pace and the build-up of volume are worked on by running, and this page does not promise a better 10 km time. Karate does not need that promise: it brings a technical catalogue, a group, an instructor who corrects, and a partner in front.

07On Nuns’ Island, in practice

The dojo is at 550 chemin du Golf, suite 010, on Nuns’ Island (Verdun), and also serves LaSalle, Pointe-Saint-Charles and the Sud-Ouest. Children train from age 4 to 13, adults from 14, five days a week: the schedule gives the groups and times, the pricing page the monthly rates.

The first class is a free trial, and there is nothing to buy beforehand: comfortable clothes and a bottle of water are enough — what to bring to your first class has the list.