The founder of our system, Masutatsu Oyama, was born in 1923 near Seoul in South Korea. He studied Chinese Kempo at nine years of age and at the age of twelve went to Japan to live and to enrol at University. After mastering judo he became a student of the legendary Gichin Funakoshi, making such rapid progress that at seventeen gained Nidan and at twenty-four became Yondan. During the war he was drafted into the military. After the war in 1947 he won the all Japan Karate Championship against all-comers!

Deciding that he wanted to devote the rest of his life to spreading his knowledge of Karate, he spent the next years in seclusion, living in temples and in the mountains, subjecting himself to the physical rigours of martial arts training day and night, meditating on Zen precepts and seeking enlightenment.

During the period of self-exile he struggled with wild animals, smashed trees and rocks with his bare hands and meditated under icy waterfalls in an extremely severe course of rigid discipline. In 1951 he returned to civilisation and started his own training Dojo. His fame spread rapidly and his ability was sensational! Among many feats he had defeated a bull with his bare hands.

After many successful tours, demonstrating his skills, training Dojos were set up all over the World. In 1965, the five-story building, Honbu. Was opened in Tokyo. Today there are Kyokushin branches in over forty countries worldwide including, of course, Great Britain.