The official GKR PTF letter is available EXCLUSIVELY as a direct download from this website, but is also posted to GKR students currently on the PTF scheme to make them aware of the change (so for those who aren’t, you’ll only be able to see it here).

Official ‘Ceasing of PTF’ Letter: http://gkr-unofficial.com/UK/PTFLetter060410.pdf

Facebook petition to save PTF: http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=112712345414808

GKR Unofficial Forums topic: https://gkr-unofficial.com/forum/gkr-chat/ptf-pre-paid-training-to-finish/

Many local and senior classes were either cancelled, re-scheduled or moved to other dojos as a result of the adverse weather conditions. In some areas of the country, classes did not even resume until this morning. Other classes had to be moved to different halls, as thousands of schools nationwide closed their doors.

Road and rail networks were heavily disrupted, meaning buses and trains that serve dojos were severely delayed. In the South-East, some bus companies withdrew all services due to the bad conditions.

It is not thought that any more disruptions to classes are happening across the UK due to the snow, however if you know differently please let us know.

As you can see, we have a brand new, custom-designed look and feel to the website, which you will find easier on the eye, better to navigate and most importantly with improved and increased content throughout. We also have a brand new logo and site branding.

Our most popular links are in the new brown navigation, including our discussion forum, articles, locations guide, and gallery. Links to other sections of the website, including our About Us and Member Lists sections can be found at the bottom of every page.

You will also notice a new sub-navigation, a smaller green bar underneath the main navigation. Unlike the static brown navigation, this changes dependent on whereabouts you are on the website. For example, if you are browsing places such as our latest news, our About Us section or our Locations guide, you will be able to click through to our new Facebook, new Twitter or YouTube pages. If you are within the discussion forum, this will change to show you a log in message (for guests) or forum-related links such as ‘Show All Unread Posts’ (for logged-in members).

We have also re-structured many parts of the website. Wherever possible, pages which no longer exist redirect to their new equivalents.

- Our About Us section has been widely increased to accommodate further information.
- Many old articles have also been edited and extended to reflect updates in GKR Karate and in this website.
- Techniques, including Kata, have also been re-written and move-by-move breakdowns have also been added.
- A brand new Locations guide has been added, which will soon be extended.
- We have increased the number of ways you can get in contact with us; see our Contact page for more.

On the right-hand side, we’ve made it easy for you to find what you’re looking for quickly. Using the ‘I Need To…’ quicklinks, you can click through to what you need even easier than before. You’ll also be able to see our latest Twitter updates via @gkrunofficial – follow us here.

We have also looked carefully at the discussion forum, and re-structured content and staff roles as appropriate.
- All content posted in all relevant areas of the forum will be moderated closely, and any discussion that inappropriately does not involve GKR will be removed (paying special attention to): General Karate (in Prime), and GKR Chat, Tournaments, Gradings, Seminars, Instructors and Products & Merchandise (all in General Karate Discussion).
- Some boards within the Information Centre and Other Stuff categories have been merged and others removed.
- Both ‘Spitfire’ and ‘Bryan’ have now concluded their roles as moderators as of today. We thank them for their time as moderators at GKR Unofficial. They will both return to their roles as regular members. To replace these two members as moderators, TheKarateChick. will step in as vice-administrator on a temporary basis until another moderator can be found. Details of the moderator vacancy/ies will be posted soon.

We hope you like, and enjoy the amendments we have made to GKR Unofficial. Please let us know what you think of the changes, or suggest improvements, by contacting us or visiting our Homepage Suggestions page on the forum.

We apologise for the inconveniences caused by this closure time, however we feel it will benefit you largely from the New Year.

N.B. All times are in GMT and relate to the forum only – adjust accordingly for international time zones.

Wednesday 23 December – As Normal

Christmas Eve – Closes 19:00
Christmas Day – Opens 02:00, Closes 20:30
Boxing Day – Closed

Sunday 27 December – Opens 13:00
Monday 28 December – As Normal
Tuesday 29 December – As Normal
Wednesday 30 December – As Normal

New Year’s Eve – As Normal
New Year’s Day – As Normal

Saturday 2 January – Closes 12:00 (Midday)
Sunday 3 January – Opens 12:00, Closes 22:00
Monday 4 January – Opens 07:00
Tuesday 5 January – As Normal

The website itself will be available all day every day from 23/12/09 to 26/12/09. Then, the homepage will be unavailable between 27/12/09 and 03/01/09 (but all other content will remain available). The site’s homepage will be re-initiated on 04/01/09; in the meantime a special placeholder page will be displayed instead of the usual index page. Many thanks for your co-operation through this project.

For these people, a new section has been introduced. The Alternative Styles board has expanded to a section of other-style discussion. This helps the members in the new membergroups to post in a place that won’t clog up the GKR sections of the forum.

The introduction of these membergroups and section DOES NOT mean we are looking for new non-GKR registrations on the forum. To register with the forum you MUST currently train in GKR Karate. This is to prevent registrants with malicious or negative intent.

From Tuesday 1st September GKR Unofficial will be cracking down on the content of ALL existing and current posts by every member to ensure that negative connotations are not showing. We will also reserve the right to verify the identity and/or location of any existing and new members if we feel that you have registered with intent to cause issues on the discussion forum, or if you have already been banned from the forum in the past.

The majority of registrants will be unaffected by these changes being carried out by the Moderation Team – we are making these changes to ensure you have a pleasant forum experience.

We’ve changed the name of the section on the forum and launched an all-new area, called Prime. All current Contributors members can continue to access the area, and now you don’t have to submit a donation to the website to access it!

All standard members can now access the new Prime area, on the condition that they refer 30 people to register as standard members on our forum. These referred members must train with GKR currently, but can be any grade within the club.

However, if you can’t refer 30 members to see the great posts currently in the new section (as of this evening there are over 130 extra posts in this section alone), you can instead send a donation of £10.00 using Paypal through our ‘Make a Contribution’ link at the bottom of this page. This will also allow you access to the Prime section of the site.

Websites with a martial arts background will be given priority, however any website deemed acceptable will be linked on the homepage and will also have a small write-up on the link given above. This will be active for the life of the site (but may be removed without warning in breach of the Terms and Conditions of the site).

A space for your link on our site is now very elusive; this website usually gets between 3,000 and 11,000 hits per day and hundreds of unique visitors each month consistently.

If you’d like a link placed on the site (a £5 fee will apply), please email us through the contact page and we will respond within 48 hours to advise you further.

Of these pages, the following have been made available:

As of 02:48BST 21/04/09
- all Articles pages

As of 03:19BST 21/04/09
- all Techniques pages
- Kata pages for Taigyoku Shodan and Nidan, Saifa and Bassai Dai.

Keep checking back to this post for the latest updates.

As a re-structure of the site is in progress, the decision has been taken to phase out the gkrunofficial.com domain (without the hyphen). This is because the site operates from the primary domain and so the forwarded domain is no longer needed.

This phase-out will begin immediately, with full removal by end of June 2009. Please ensure all bookmarks and favourites have the primary domain, https://www.gkr-unofficial.com, to prevent disappointment in the future.

Much more information will follow within the next few days.