“THE RED BELT WITH BLACK STRIPE REPRESENTS ‘FIRE AND HEAVEN.’ IT SIGNIFIES HUMILITY, HONORS THE WISDOM, AND COMMITS TO THE WILLINGNESS OF BEING A LIFETIME STUDENT OF KENPO, WITH THE FINAL GOAL ‘THE REAL HEAVEN.’”
~BRIGITTE SCHULTE AND MICHAEL MILLER, CHINESEKARATEFEDERATION.COM
High red belt was the penultimate belt before first degree black belt in my Kenpo school. It was the stage at which we were invited to enter the black belt cycle: sixteen weeks of grueling four- to five-day-a-week classes and as many three- to five-mile runs; three-mile runs had to be completed in twenty-four minutes to attain black belt.
The Saturday morning black belt candidate class was a three-hour cardio and material class. Every month on one of the Saturdays, candidates engaged in a black belt pre-test in which we were graded and assessed by the master of our school as to our readiness for black belt; if you were not deemed ready, you would be cut after a pre-test. The pressure was immense to complete the cycle.